NOW Jeremy Corbyn is hinting at a policy of a free university education once more in England and a major national newspaper is saying this would cost £10 billion.

When the SNP introduced free university education in Scotland in 2007 am I right in thinking they wrote off student debt?

When I worked at the Student Loan Company up until a year ago we were told the student loan book was the Government’s biggest asset and was worth £90 billion. A small proportion of that was loaned to EU students.

So does Mr Corbyn intend we should not abolish student debt in England but just fund future English students with grants and free university tuition moving forward? Or has that major national newspaper miscalculated the cost by 800 per cent? Were we as employees of SLC misinformed?

Or is Corbyn only doing half the job?

In the 1997 election campaign Tony Blair allowed people to run away with the idea Labour would not introduce university tuition Fees. Then Labour came to power, adopted Tory spending plans for its first two years and used this as the reason why university tuition fees were introduced.

Is Corbyn dangling that same carrot in the hope of outflanking the Greens taking Caroline Lucas’s seat in Brighton Pavilion and seeing off strong Green challenges in Bristol West, Sheffield Central, Bath and the Isle of Wight or does he mean it? We’ve been up this garden path with Labour already once before.

Nigel Boddy, Darlington