The government is paying insufficient attention to the dire need for extra funds to save millions of students from leaving the education system because they have run out of money, says an opposition MP.
Paramee Waichongcharoen, a list-MP from the Move Forward Party, raised the issue during the debate on the 2025 fiscal budget bill in the House of Representatives on Thursday.
An estimated 1.02 million children have either dropped out of school or chosen not to attend a higher level of education due to poverty, said Paramee, citing a report published recently by the Equitable Education Fund (EEF).
Another 3 million students from extremely poor families are now at risk of facing the same fate, but only about 2 million of them have gained access to state funds intended for financing their education. The rest are on the verge of exiting the education system for good, said the opposition MP, who was a teacher before entering politics.
Last year 12.45% of students from families classified as extremely poor decided against continuing their education to the undergraduate level of university after finishing high school, said Paramee.
“As opposed to its previous vow made in parliament that it would urgently address disparities in terms of educational opportunities, the government is now giving those organisations that are working to eradicate those disparities less funding than they need,” the MP said.
The Student Loan Fund (SLF) requested 19 billion baht in government subsidies in the 2024 fiscal year, as it faced a liquidity problem for the first time in a decade. But the government handed over only 800 million baht, said Paramee.
For fiscal 2025, the fund has requested 5 billion baht and the government has refused to bargain.
Paramee urged the government to make the education at the basic level free of charge so that students and their families no longer have to pay for any other associated schooling costs.
The MP pointed out that Deputy Finance Minister Julapun Amornvivat said there was still enough money set aside that could be diverted to subsidise the SLF should it really require help.
The fund’s cash-flow problem stems from an earlier amendment to the SLF Act in which the default interest rate was retrospectively lowered from 18% to 0.5%, the MP said.
The SLF had to borrow funds to reimburse many borrowers who had already made larger repayments than required. It still owes those borrowers about 1 billion baht.