On almost a daily basis, we are witnessing the full scale of the problems confronting John Swinney in education.

This week, it has been the SNP's failure on post-16 education that has been fully exposed. Most importantly, it has been the fact that the SNP has presided over a significant fall in bursary and grant support which is having a disproportionate and detrimental impact on our poorest students.

The sum of money going to students who are in receipt of bursaries or grants is now £66.1m yet, five years ago, the figure stood at £127.7m. In the same time period, bursaries and grants have fallen from 22% of the student support pot to only 8%. This matters greatly because it means that the main focus is now on loans which have to be paid back whereas bursaries and grants do not.

On television at the weekend, we heard the Scottish Government's former higher education adviser, Lucy Hunter-Blackburn, say that the reason for the huge drop in bursary and grant funding as a percentage share of the whole student support package in Scotland is because the Scottish Government has had to protect its commitment to so called "free" higher education.

Lucy Hunter-Blackburn went on to say that "even in absence of tuition fees, levels of final debt for low-income Scottish students who study in Scotland is comparable with, and in certain cases, higher than debt levels for similar students from the other devolved administrations".

She was followed on TV by the higher education minister, Shirley-Anne Somerville, who, despite persistent questioning, could not come up with a single piece of evidence as to how the Scottish Government's "free" higher education funding policy, in comparison to other funding policies and those of other countries, benefits poorer students.

Neither could the cabinet secretary himself at the education committee.

All the SNP can say is that "free" higher education is "a matter of principle" but they cannot produce the facts to say how it helps poorer students. That is because there isn't any evidence.

Nor can they provide a satisfactory explanation to those many domiciled Scottish students who, despite their very good qualifications gained at school, are finding it harder and harder to get into a Scottish university because their places are capped whereas the places for rUK and international are not capped. That is yet another inherent unfairness in SNP policy.

Then there is the issue of colleges and the fact that three-quarters of our colleges are facing financial deficits in the current financial year. Not only have they had to put up with the stresses and strains of regionalisation and mergers, the cost of which looks likely to be £69m set against the savings of £52m, but they have been forced into substantial staffing cuts, and they have seen the loss of 152,000 college places, at the very time when vocational training and skills training is supposed to be another priority of the SNP.

The SNP says this has been necessary in order to put the focus on full-time equivalent places from where, it tells us, it will provide better employment opportunities. Perhaps, but not for all.

Part-time college places are vital, particularly for women and students who wish to balance family, work and study in order to help supplement living costs and they are also crucial for many people who might be quite far removed from the labour market. In other words, the college cuts have also had a disproportionate effect on those the SNP purport to help most.

No one disputes the need to address the attainment gap. Whilst the main focus for that should be on early years and schools policy, there have to be complementary policies in further and higher education.

So far, the SNP is singularly failing to produce them.

Comment by Liz Smith. Liz is the shadow cabinet secretary for education in the Scottish Parliament and a Conservative MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife.