STORY
The Treasury Committee has received more than 52,000 responses to its public survey on student loans and the taxation of graduates. MPs said it was one of the highest response rates ever recorded for a select committee inquiry.
Of the 49,357 respondents who had taken out student loans, 40,373 said the financial impact of repayments combined with taxation was worse than expected. A further 45,843 said they did not think the level of interest and repayment terms were reasonable, while 34,555 said repayments had materially affected their future financial planning.
The Committee stressed that the responses came from a self-selecting group and should not be treated as a representative sample of the whole population. The evidence will nevertheless inform its inquiry into student loans, interest rates, repayment terms and the wider interaction between graduate repayments and the tax system.