Hello and welcome to The Rundown, a podcast from Politics Home with me Alan Tolhurst.

This week, we're delving into the world of student finance. After a long simmering row over the

loan system for how graduates pay back the cost of their tuition, exploded into the mainstream,

as a growing cohort, including many new MPs, who went to university in the past decade, reckon with the fact the plan-to repayment system thereon means to the mainstream. As a growing cohort, including many new MPs, who went to university in the past

decade, reckon with the fact the Plan 2 repayment system thereon means they now owe more

than they borrowed despite years of regular payments. Women to discuss what the government can do

to prevent a rising feeling of intergenerational unfairness, as some graduates face huge marginal

tax rates, are the Labour MP Chris Curtis, Kate Ogden,

senior research economists at the Institute of Fiscal Studies, Danny Payne, Head of Education and Social

Policy at the Social Market Foundation, and Sienna Rogers, my colleague here, Deputy

Editor of the House magazine.

So, Sienna, starting with you then. Just explain to us the kind of the situation

that we're discussing and why this kind of row over repayments for student loans is back in the

news at the moment. So it's back in the news at the moment, I mean, for various reasons, but the

Chancellor defended the system. And there are lots of Labour MPs, particularly from the new intake,

who actually are on this kind of plan two of the loan.

So I am two. I left Union 2015. I started in 2012. That means that I was the first year of plan two, which is when they trebled tuition fees.

Now I had the benefit of various like maintenance grants and things like that. So it was better for me

than it was for people who came later. But I left with the debt of just under 40,000. And after a

decade of repayments now, it's reached 48,900 the last time I looked. Right. Okay. And that's

because essentially this plan too, this change in the system, not only was an increase in fees fees, was also an increase in the amount of interest placed upon it. And it's a lot of the rowers to do with the way that the interest is being sort of calculated. Chris Siena mentioned there, a group of MPs, the 2024 cohort of which you are one. I mean, you can declare how much you owe if you, if you like, but explain to us why you and some of your other Labour

colleagues are bringing this up at the moment as well. Yes, so I was, I went to university in 2012,

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