The National Assembly for Wales’ Enterprise and Learning Committee has published a report in response to a petition which called for the Education Maintenance Allowance (EMA) to be based on individual student, rather than parental household incomes.

The principal petitioner, Catrin Anne Davies from Flintshire, argued that young people over 16 years are considered to be adult by their parents, and so are not always supported financially by them. Therefore, eligibility for EMA should be based on the individual’s income, rather than that of their parents.

However, the Committee came to the conclusion that extending EMA to be a universal benefit would mean that limited resources would have to be spread more thinly, and so would not be of as much benefit to students from low income families.

Other recommendations from the Committee include:

• The Welsh Assembly government should carry out an evaluation of the impact of the EMA on educational performance;
• Anomalies in the calculation of household income should be addressed in order to remove any unfairness;
• Systems should be put in place ensure that unacceptable delays in EMA payments do not happen again.

The report can be downloaded from the National Assembly for Wales’ website.