Good News for Poor Students!

There's a possibility that student allowances will increase this year!

According to this article on Stuff the average student allowance paid out was a bit more than $140 a week. I got just a bit under $100 a week, while Hamish only just got about $50 a week, although he did start off at $12 a week during his first year of uni!

This year's budget might include an increase in the student allowance, Tertiary Education Minister Pete Hodgson said today.

Students were asking for an increase in their allowance and this was what the Government would tackle next, he said.

Mr Hodgson told Radio New Zealand that the average student debt of nearly $30,000 was "too high".

"There's a lot of things at play here including the tendency for some banks to shovel loans towards students in order to have them as customers."

But the underlying issue was that the student allowance plus the accommodation allowance had not shifted for many years "and needs to".

There "might" be an increase in allowances in this year's budget, Mr Hodgson said.

"That's as far as I can go in January," he said.

"Allowances haven't shifted in many years and they need to."

This would happen over a "number of years"....

Over a number of years? I wonder how big this increase will be then, and whether it will continue to increase over the years should (Bob forbid) National get into power!