They also felt that tuition fees for Open University and part-time courses should be tackled in time. Liberal Democrats have been pressing for much better access and provision for the nursery and pre-school system. Starting education at an early stage was proved to filter through into people s aspirations later on. The need to look at the broader field of social policy was pointed out as governments were not good at tackling aspirations and attitudes because they judged governance in terms of raw outputs. The Government ought to be concerned with the quality of provision of public services.
Tuition fees are a barrier, adding to the idea that higher education is expensive.
Liberal Democrats would like to move to a situation where people in further and higher education were not seen as dependent on their parents. This would remove part of the barrier of the perceived financial consequences but aspirational barriers would still need to be tackled. The sources of funding were covered in their submission. The current situation is that housing benefits and social security benefits have been taken away and it was felt that these should be restored. In addition the loan system could be improved in the short term prior to its replacement.