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We always have to reasses, with every Parliament,
our priorities as a party,
but I do not think that the time as yet come
when we need to drop our very important commitment
to ending tuition fees and ensuring that students
are able to emerge from higher and further education
without an enormous debt hanging around their neck.
We know that higher education isn't free,
we know that students get into debt,
but do we really want to make it any worse?
But the issue about how our best institutions compete
with some of those, particularly in the United States,
is, I think, an important one,
and what I would like to see those world class research institutions doing
is ensuring that they are much more ambitious
about going to their own alumni,
who are some of the best heeled people in this country,
and indeed around the world,
and building up the sort of funds
that universities like Harvard and Yale and Princeton have
so that we can compete on the research side
and on the cutting edge
along with the best around the world.