In a written ministerial statement, Higher Education Minister David Lammy said that “decisive action is required to change the service”, and that “the key to this is strengthening the leadership of the Company and ensuring that the customer is at the heart of everything the Company does”. David Lammy also confirmed that “the senior management team of the Company will be strengthened and reorganised”.
NUS President, Wes Streeting, said:
“The poor leadership and management of the Student Loans Company has led to disruption and hardship for hundreds of thousands of students. Given the catalogue of failures identified by this report, heads must roll if the public are to have any confidence in the SLC in the future.
“We welcome the speed with which Ministers have acted to get this report out in time to effect changes for the coming cycle of applications. Through the new stakeholder forum announced today, the SLC board can expect tough scrutiny from NUS to ensure that senior management is held fully accountable in the way students deserve. The events of the past few months must never happen again and we expect the SLC board to move heaven and earth to get the remaining cases dealt with, and the system on track for 2010 entrants.”
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