As someone who receives close to the maximum student loan from the government each year, I try my best not to think too hard about the crushing financial burden I am going to carry into my postgrad years. After all, for those of us who need a degree to enter their field of employment and don’t have the family finances to sail us through, it doesn’t matter how unfair the system becomes: student loans are a trap we have little choice but to fall into.

Ignoring the problem has, however, become impossible over the past week, as a public spat between the financial adviser Martin Lewis and the chancellor, Rachel Reeves, over a hidden detail in November’s budget kicked off a fierce debate about the fairness of our student loans system. Almost 6 million people on plan 2 loans, which were taken out by students from England who started university between September 2012 and July 2023, and students from Wales who have started since September 2012, will now be facing higher repayments after Reeves took the decision to freeze the salary threshold until 2030.

The change has tapped into a mounting frustration that it is those already struggling who end up footing the bill, while those with the broadest shoulders waltz away scot-free. The myth that was constantly drilled into me growing up – that anything is possible if you work hard enough – once again finds........

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