The debts of thousands of graduates would be reduced or even written off by a Labour government, Jeremy Corbyn has said in a pitch to younger voters.
He said that he wanted to “ameliorate” the debt owed by students, most of whom paid fees of £9,000 a year.
Labour has already promised to scrap tuition fees for students embarking on their degrees from this autumn.
For those already studying, no more tuition fees would be paid for the rest of their course, which would cost around £7.5 billion a year. The party has also vowed to restore maintenance grants, taking the total cost of its higher education spending pledges to £11.2 billion.
In an interview with the NME magazine, Mr Corbyn said that students who went to university after higher fees were introduced were victims of a “historical misfortune”. But he admitted he did not know how it could be paid for.
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Analysis of the scale of debts accumulated since fees were imposed in 2012 suggests that it is about £30 billion.
The estimate by the Institute for Fiscal Studies said clearing or reducing the debts would be “extremely costly”.
Mr Corbyn told the NME that he was exploring ways to ease the debt burden for young graduates.
“Yes, there is a block of those that currently have a massive debt, and I’m looking at ways we could reduce that, ameliorate that, lengthen the period of paying it off, or some other means of reducing the debt burden,” he said.
The latest pledge is likely to result in more criticism that Labour has no hope of affording its plans. In the televised debate on Wednesday, Amber Rudd, the home secretary, said that Mr Corbyn would need to find a “magic money tree” to fulfil the party’s promises.
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The Conservatives claimed yesterday that Mr Corbyn had backed a militant squatters group who issued a “how to” guide on breaking into properties.
He is also accused of refusing to evict illegal camps when in charge of planning at Haringey council in north London. Mr Corbyn and John McDonnell, the shadow chancellor, had hosted pro-squatting campaigners Squash in Parliament in 2013, the Tories said.
They claimed that Labour’s manifesto plans for travellers’ rights and to support the “nomadic way of life” could see taxpayers’ money being used to help trespassers and illegal camps.
Brandon Lewis, a Home Office minister, said: “Jeremy Corbyn wants to give taxpayers’ money to trespassers and give a green light to illegal encampments across England.”