Scottish Executive refuses to pay for graduate students

Helen Barratt Clegg scholar, BMJ

The Scottish Executive is refusing to pay NHS bursaries for Scottish graduate students studying on the new fast track medical degree programmes in England. English and Welsh students studying on the four year courses at Cambridge, Oxford, Leicester Warwick, and St George's Hospital in London will be entitled to receive the bursaries in their final three years.

The situation arose after the introduction of the new programme at Leicester Warwick Medical School, one of several new medical faculties in the UK. Of the 64 students in the first year, two are from Wales and another two from Scotland. It became apparent that these four would not be entitled to the NHS bursaries. After consultation with the university the Welsh National Assembly agreed to pay, but the Scottish Executive maintained that it would not. English students on the fast track courses are entitled to a 100% student loan in their first year, then a 50% loan plus a means tested bursary later in the course. They will pay tuition fees only in year one. However, Scottish students will be forced to take the full loan, on top of what they have already borrowed during their first degree, as well as paying full tuition fees.

The decision has been met with dismay by the other universities due to run similar courses. Dr Ken Fleming, head of Oxford's division of medical sciences, said: "We are surprised and concerned to learn of this decision by the Scottish Executive as effectively it will discourage Scottish students from coming here to study on our accelerated graduate programme."

A similar course is about to be introduced at Cambridge University, and one of the 20 students scheduled to start the course in September comes from Scotland. Joanne Lucas, a spokesperson for the university, criticised the ruling saying that it would severely disadvantage Scottish applicants. The university has written to John Denham, the health minister, on the student's behalf, who is applying for various other bursaries and to medical charities in an effort to make up the shortfall.

A spokesperson for the health department of the Scottish Executive, who asked not to be named, confirmed that there are "no plans to reverse the decision." She added that the Cubie report into student funding after devolution had changed the way that student support would be provided in Scotland. There are no fast track medical courses north of the border, but she said that the department was acting on legal advice that NHS funding should be provided only for Scottish people studying in Scotland and to do otherwise would be to set a precedent which would be unfair to others. She advised students considering applying for the English courses "to consider all the factors and make their own decision."



studentBMJ 2001;09:305-356 September ISSN 0966-6494