I said 50% were convinced that they "should" go to Uni, not that amount would actually go.

The problem isn't going to university the problem was New Labour convinced lower classes that it was right for them to go to university.

In the 1980s you got a state grant to go but it was generally people well bred that went to university and we were doing proper subjects like Ancient History and Classics, or as we called it at Oxford "Literae Humaniores". These were courses that taught you important things and more importantly they told you how to think, and this has served us in good stead in our jobs in the City, at the top of industry and the Civil Service, leading the country.

Then came Blair and his well meaning leftist chums who wanted every ruffian from a comprehensive to go to university and do what I would call a Mickey Mouse course.

I have to think back to the wise words of Dr Hendrik Verwoerd in South Africa, the "high priest of Apartheid" who when passing the Bantu education act said "The Bantu child should be taught from a young age that equality with the white man is not for him". A bit non pc for the modern age but I think we would be wise to remember again that university isn't for everyone, just for the elite, a lot of people, especially from the working class rugby league communities that frequent these forums, just aren't meant for it.

The issue with tuition fees is that it puts off many poorer students from going to University.

It was Blair that started the mass University rush not Major.

If the numbers who went to University were kept at 1980's levels, then the country could afford this without resorting to tuition fees.

Sorry, Major started it with the conversion of Polys into University of some indistinct area, Blair just continued down the same road (as he did with many of the Major/Thatcher policies). It was the Major government for instance that started the drive to university educate all nurses for instance.

It's the Conservatives that encourage people to better themselves and go for things like higher education.

Labour just encourages the feckless to sit on their backsides watching their plasma TVs and let the rest of us pay for them.

In a little over 5 years, that'll be me

Nope, that again was started by Thatcher and continued thru to Brown, Thatcher wrote off large swathes of the workforce by getting rid of industries like mining and replacing them with very little, there are still areas where mining and steel were once the backbone of society where two generations only know life on benefits.

Why not be the first option in my post and be aspirational and go to university?

If you haven't already been and had student finance there's nothing to stop you going to university and getting a tuition fee after you have retired.

If your pension doesn't take you over the threshold for repayment you don't have to pay it back.

Why not spend your retirement getting ratted at the taxpayers expense at the SU bar and pulling some freshers. You will never end up having to pay it back, unless you live an unusually long time on an unusually high pension.

I seriously doubt that in 5 years time I'll be in any position to kick back and watch the world go by. Well not if I want to eat and stay warm anyway

Quite right, too sally cinnamon.