Sir, – The argument put forward by Diarmuid Hegarty seems to forget a key factor regarding the introduction of a student loan system ("Imagine a degree for less than the cost of Ford Fiesta", Education Opinion, February 16th).
The comparison of a student loan to a mortgage or car loan ignores the obvious fact that the student loan is an additional expense on top of those loans. Unless young people are to forget such notions as owning a car or a home?
The introduction of a student loan system is just another step in the rampant neo-liberalism of recent years, alongside the aim to abandon the idea of higher education as a public good and commodify it instead. – Yours, etc,
SEAN CASSIDY,
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Students Against Fees,
Dublin City University,
Dublin 9.