Pandemic forces France to contemplate UK-style student loans

France is debating whether to introduce a UK-style system of income-contingent student loans to cover living costs after the pandemic lockdown robbed students of much of their income, leaving them to rely on food banks and subsidised canteen meals.

As in Germany, the shuttering of restaurants, cafes and bars has left French students without part-time work, while the broader recession meant that their parents had less money to bail them out.

One of the country’s most influential thinktanks now argues that the time is right for a shift towards loans for living costs, paid back by graduates when they reach a certain income threshold, like in the UK.

“Many people in France were shocked by the fact that students would queue for food banks,” said Francis Verillaud, a special adviser at the Paris-based Institut Montaigne, which is funded and led by French corporations. The pandemic has finally exposed a system that was already inadequate, he said. “It’s broken down.”

In late January, the financial and psychological plight of students – exemplified by a handful of suicide attempts in Lyon – came to national prominence, with president Emmanuel Macron promising better access to university psychologists and subsidised meals at campus canteens.

But critics say the government has not fixed the underlying system. Rémy Valero, treasurer of the Lyon Student Solidarity Collective, an aid organisation, said that the group had been delivering food to at least 400 students a week throughout the winter, and could not meet demand.

“All the part-time jobs just stopped, and there was no help specifically targeted at students,” he said.

Students in France do receive to a government scholarship to cover living costs, based on their parents’ income. But even the maximum amounts to just €473 (£410) a month, and is only available to full-time European Union students under 28 years old.

Just over a third of all students receive a scholarship, with part-time work and parents’ savings covering the rest of their costs. Students in Germany are similarly dependent on these private sources of income.

“It [the scholarship] doesn’t give you what a normal worker would earn if he made the minimum wage,” said Mr Valero. And relying on parents for living costs ignores students who are, for example, estranged from their families, he pointed out.

The state of the country’s student accommodation has also reportedly exacerbated French students’ mental health problems: tiny rooms, sometimes no more than 9m², became unbearable under strict lockdown conditions that in the winter of 2020 banned all but trips out for groceries and a daily hour of exercise.

A year before the country’s next presidential election, the Institut Montaigne’s proposal for interest-free loans has thrown open a debate over student financing that is likely to be highly contentious.

Under its scheme, the thinktank argues, repayments would be far lower than in the UK – just €35 a month for a graduate earning a post-tax salary of €1,500 a month. It also wants to hike French tuition fees to €900 a year at the bachelor’s level, and €1,200 at the master’s, with some of this extra money flowing back through universities into student support.

Student unions are likely to be fiercely opposed, however. “It’s not good for students to start life with a loan,” said Simon Merisse, vice-president of UNEDESEP, a union representing law, management, and political and economic science students. “It’s a poisoned gift.” Instead, he would prefer a system that better helps students to find jobs while studying.

david.matthews@timeshighereducation.com