Hello and welcome to another sparkling edition of Plank of the Week. We are back in the studio and I'm joined by Patrick Christie's for the first time on Plank of the Week. Patrick, very good afternoon to you. And Emily Carver, a veteran of the Plank List from some time ago. Both I'm looking forward to today because not only are you possibly young enough to be my children, You're possibly young enough to be my grandchildren,

which is quite disturbing, really. But listen, Patrick, since you are here for the first time,

I think we should give you the honours to kick us off with your first plank of the week.

All right. Well, I couldn't narrow it down to one person. I've gone for universities.

Right. That sounds good to me. They've always annoyed me. Most of my friends got a two-one. I got a first in cirrhosis of the liver when I was there. But the big news this week is that Unis are going to continue to charge the full 9,250 quid annual tuition fees, even if campuses remain closed and there's no face-to-face classes, which I think is taking the Mick a little bit.

The average wage of a vice-chancellor is 253 grand a year as well.

So they're not short of a quid or two.

But look, I mean, there are some ridiculous courses out there.

You can do David Beckham Studies at Staffordshire University.

You can do brewing and distilling at Harriet Watt University

and contemporary circus and physical performance at Bath Spa.

So that's worth the 9,000 250 quid a year.

I'm not sure who would pay for that.

I don't know who ever thought that if you said to these universities,

you know, you can charge anything you like up to 9,000 pounds,

that they wouldn't all just go, okay, $9,000, it is then, Patrick.

Exactly.

So 75% of all English universities, this is in 2018, and this figure has gone up now,

but they are charging the absolute maximum.

But the fact as well is, and this is the thing, that you come out of university, you know,

with just a lifetime of debt. You've got

17 billion quid is loaned to students every single year, and most of that gets put straight

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