Bread and butter

Labour's higher education spokesman Bryan Davies was pleased to find no sign of the high life some used to associate with the Student Loans Company - although he came away from a recent visit feeling rather hungry.

"It is under what I can only describe now as a rather more Puritan regime," Mr Davies told a student finance conference audience last week.

The loans people opted for a frugal lunch and Mr Davies received a sandwich of "very modest proportions".

"I can only assume it was a statement," said Mr Davies, under whose auspices the SLC would very likely be brown bread.