Nick Hillman: We must continue to expand higher education

The second in a three-part series of contributions from the ‘New Blue Book’.

Nadhim Zahawi: Why the basic rate of income tax for younger people should be cut

In an era when it is harder for young people to buy a house, or even just to pay rent, it makes sense to direct more help to them than older people who already have one.

In the wake of A-level results, the focus is on Universities. But we need a technical education expansion.

As the Conservatives anxiously mull their prospects with younger voters, shouldn’t they think a bit more about the two-thirds who don’t go to University?

John Baron: It’s time to embrace the One-Nation message – and win

As possibly the only Brexiteer in the Parliamentary Party’s One Nation group, I am also only too aware that this message must be accompanied by a successful EU negotiation.

Ministers must decide what higher education is for

Successive governments have ducked the question of which degrees are actually public goods worth spending taxpayers’ money on.

Alex Morton: A modest proposal. Quotas to help another disadvantaged minority – Conservatives.

We have allowed our enemies to infiltrate almost every power centre that matters and delegitimise our very existence.

James Scales: Technical education – still a pale shadow of its academic cousin

There is not enough cross-pollination between the education sector and employers. And careers advice must be dramatically improved

The great Conservative student panic

The next manifesto might propose breaking the link between student maintenance costs and parental income by introducing a universal loan.

Corbyn’s idle promises on student debt come back to bite Labour

That the Opposition are willing to risk alienating key supporters even whilst preparing for an early election shows how dangerous they think this policy is.

Prospects for the economy 2) Andy Silvester: The fundamentals are strong. But confidence is in shorter supply.

Doomsday predictions remain overblown, but the real, specific concerns of business are worth listening to nonetheless.

Salman Anwar: If we want to win student votes, never mind tuition fees. A bigger problem by far is maintenance loans.

The Party should propose a radical shake-up of this system in which we aim to break the link from parental income to the overall loan.

Scott Kelly: For jobs and prosperity, young people need better technical eduction, not more higher education

The opportunity for young people to gain high-level work related skills would also help bridge the social divide between those who have a degree and those who do not.

Andy Cook: The Conservatives don’t need a majority to transform Britain

It is perfectly possible to govern well and enact great change with very little legislation. In fact, it can even be a blessing.

42 per cent and no majority 2) The Party must make the case for conservatism to a new generation of voters. It hasn’t for too long.

As time passes, a decreasing slice of the electorate has any experience at all of old-fashioned socialism. And the argument that it doesn’t work cuts little ice.

Simon Clarke: Students. Don’t cringe, try to be cool and promise to scrap tuition fees. Instead, treat them as adults.

And just about the worse thing we could do would be to send out the campus Tory boys and girls to bark the party’s message like an army of daleks.