Corbyn admits he had no idea how much it would cost when he told students he would 'deal with' their existing debts and DENIES the pledge was ever meant to be a promise

Corbyn admits he had no idea how much it would cost when he told students he would 'deal with' their existing debts and DENIES the pledge was ever meant to be a promise



Jeremy Corbyn has admitted he had no idea how much it would cost when he told students he would 'deal with' their existing debts.

The Labour leader told students on the eve of the election he would find a way to slash their debt burden.

But after the June 8 poll Labour admitted wiping out the student loan book would cost £100billion.

Mr Corbyn today insisted he never intended to make a 'commitment' on clearing debts as he scrambled to defuse Tory claims he had betrayed his core supporters.



He told the BBC's Andrew Marr: 'I pointed out we had written the manifesto in a short space of time because there was a surprise election but that we would look at ways of reducing that debt burden, recognising that a lot of it is never going to be collected anyway and try and reduce that burden.'

'We never said we would completely abolish it because we were unaware of the size of it at the time,' he added.

Mr Corbyn said his shadow chancellor John McDonnell had a working group on the idea and that a policy announcement would be made soon.



In an interview with NME just days before polling day, Mr Corbyn said: 'And I don't see why those that had the historical misfortune to be at university during the £9,000 period should be burdened excessively compared to those that went before or those that come after.

'I will deal with it.'