Scotsman - 'End free universities and spend cash on educating the illiterate instead'

Students should be forced to pay fees to attend Scottish universities, with public money diverted to help eradicate illiteracy and innumeracy, one of Scotland's most influential education figures says today. Andrew Cubie, architect of the graduate endowment scheme, questions whether it is "ethically acceptable" to have free tertiary education when one Scot in five cannot read or write.

It might be an idea to try and ensure that the money that is being spent already on educating children from the age of five actually produces at the very least a minimum standard of literacy and numeracy for all. What has money got to do with it? It isn't lack of funds that causes children to spend 11 or 12 years in a full-time education system only to emerge devoid of the most basic skills in reading, writing and arithmetic, it's piss-poor teaching.