On Sunday mornings if I’m awake (and sometimes on Friday evenings if I’m still awake) I listen to Alastair Cooke’s Letter From America on Radio 4. The archives include the text of one memorable edition of the programme from June 1968.
Of course, the disc jockey John Peel was working in Dallas in 1963.
The business of selling educational credentials to foreigners is a major export-earner for the British educational system. It’s good for the economy, it directly subsidizes our own higher education sector, and it attracts the best and the brightest from overseas. We should be exporting educational qualifications and encouraging immigration by high-calibre workers, rather than slamming the shutters down on those who are demonstrating their usefulness by studying in British institutions, learning our language, and wanting to work (and in so doing, damaging our education sector’s financial stability).
Also, to the extent that defaulting Tier 4 enrolled students are showing low levels of attendance, the logical deduction is that *they are contributing productively to our economy.* (They’re not eligible for benefits, so what are they doing? Answer: they’re working.)
So the whole thrust of this consultation exercise is wrong-headed and arguably based on racist assumptions.
Finally, the phrasing of this survey’s questions are biased towards inducing responses that conform to the desired policy goals of the government, rather than representing an open-ended effort at consultation. To be blunt, it’s a politically biased push-poll, funded with public money. Shame! Whoever commissioned this study is clearly trying to astroturf the appearance of support for restrictions on access to higher education by foreign students rather than to conduct an honest survey of public opinion. Consequently, the questions are biased against any relaxation of entry requirements. (I’ll be raising the matter with my MP in due course.)