Essay technique
Planning the Argument: Five Distinct Points
LNAT Section B · Technique guide
The question this answers
This is a technique guide, not a single prompt. It teaches how to plan, structure and time an LNAT Section B essay using the "five distinct points" method, and it works the method on a running example prompt: should a university education be free at the point of use, paid for by the taxpayer rather than the student?
The stance
There is no single correct stance for a technique guide; the skill is to pick one stance early, defend it with five non-overlapping points, steel-man the other side, and never sit on the fence. On the worked example below the demonstrated stance is qualified: tuition should not be entirely free, but a fairer income-contingent system, fully free for the worst-off, is the position a strong applicant can actually defend in 40 minutes.
Defining the terms
- "Section B" is the 40-minute essay paper of the LNAT: you choose one of three prompts and write roughly 500-750 words. It is not marked for legal knowledge; it tests whether you can build a structured, persuasive argument under time pressure, which is exactly the skill of a first-year law student.
- "A distinct point" means an argument that stands on a different axis from your others, so that knocking one down leaves the rest intact. Two points that are really the same idea in different clothes ("it is unfair" and "it is unjust") count as one point and waste a paragraph.
- "Planning the argument" means the five minutes before you write: paraphrase the prompt, surface its hidden assumption, pick a stance, and lock down five distinct points with one piece of evidence each. The plan is the essay; the writing is just transcription.
Assumptions to interrogate
- That a 'should' question assumes the thing is possible and coherent, not that it is currently absent: 'should university be free?' does not assume it is not free now, only that making it free is physically and logically possible and worth arguing about. Naming this assumption is itself a markable move.
- That the prompt does not force a binary. Many candidates assume 'should X?' demands a flat yes or no; the stronger move is often a qualified stance ('yes, but only where...') that the planner builds in from the start rather than discovering halfway through.
- That five genuinely distinct axes exist for almost any LNAT prompt: ethical, legal/political, economic/practical, social/consequential, and philosophical/theoretical. The planning skill is mapping a prompt onto these axes rather than generating five variations of one instinct.
- That a worked legal example is allowed but never required: LNAT essays are scored on reasoning, so a precise authority or statistic is a bonus that demonstrates range, not a gate you must pass.
The case for
Paraphrase the prompt and expose its buried assumption before writing a word, so that you argue about the real question rather than the words on the page.
Spend sixty seconds rewriting the prompt in your own words and asking what it quietly takes for granted. A 'should' question assumes the action is possible and coherent, not that it is currently absent, so 'should university be free?' is not asking whether it is free now but whether the taxpayer should bear the cost instead of the graduate. Spotting that the prompt smuggles in a false binary, or a contested definition (what counts as 'free' when graduates pay through later taxes?), lets you reframe the debate on your own terms. Examiners reward the candidate who interrogates the question, because that is the move a lawyer makes with a statute or a contract clause.
Choose your stance in the first two minutes and commit, because a decisive qualified position beats a balanced fence-sit every time.
The single most common Section B failure is the essay that lists arguments on both sides and never decides. A strong applicant picks a stance early, ideally a qualified one ('free for the poorest, income-contingent for everyone else'), and bends every paragraph toward it. Commitment is not the same as crudeness: you can concede the other side generously and still land a clear verdict. The plan should open with one sentence stating the thesis, so that when you write under time pressure you never drift. A reader should be able to predict your conclusion from your introduction and find it confirmed, not contradicted, at the end.
Build five points on five different axes (ethical, legal, economic, social, philosophical) so that each paragraph adds something genuinely new.
Unlike the first point, which is about the question, and the second, which is about your verdict, this is about coverage: the deliberate spread of arguments so that no two paragraphs overlap. Map the prompt onto distinct categories. On free tuition: an ethical axis (is education a right or a private investment?), a legal-political axis (what does the social contract owe citizens?), an economic axis (graduate premium and who should pay for it), a social axis (mobility and access), and a philosophical axis (Rawls on the least well-off versus Nozick on forced redistribution). Five axes guarantee range; five versions of 'it is fair' guarantee a thin essay. State at the top of each paragraph why it differs from the last.
Attach exactly one concrete piece of evidence to each point, an example, a statistic, a thinker or an authority, so that assertion becomes argument.
Distinct from coverage, this is about depth: a claim with no support is just an opinion, while a claim anchored to Rawls's difference principle, to the abolition and later reinstatement of tuition fees, or to a participation statistic, reads as reasoning. One anchor per paragraph is enough; the LNAT is not a research exam and over-citation wastes words you do not have. The discipline is to pick the single best illustration and deploy it precisely. A named thinker used accurately is worth more than three vague gestures at 'studies show', and it signals the intellectual range admissions tutors are screening for.
Steel-man the strongest objection inside the essay and answer it, rather than ignoring it or attacking a weak version.
The final move that separates a 2:1 essay from a first is engaging the best counter-argument honestly. After making your five points, devote a paragraph to the most powerful objection to your stance, stated at full strength, then dismantle its hinge. If you argue against fully free tuition, the strongest objection is that fees deter the poorest from applying; you must concede the risk and then show why a means-tested, income-contingent design answers it better than blanket abolition would. This is distinct from merely listing 'points against'; it is the dialectical turn where you prove your stance survives its hardest test. A reader trusts the writer who has clearly looked for the holes in their own case.
The case against
Over-planning eats the clock: a candidate who spends fifteen of forty minutes mapping axes may run out of time to write.
The objection to a rigid five-point method is that planning can become procrastination. In a 40-minute paper the plan should take about five minutes, not fifteen, and it should be skeletal: a one-line thesis, five three-word point labels and one evidence cue each. The risk is real, which is why the technique insists the plan is lightweight scaffolding, not a second essay. Discipline on timing matters as much as the structure itself.
Forcing five points can manufacture filler when a prompt genuinely supports only three strong axes.
Some prompts are narrow, and stretching for a fifth distinct point produces a weak or repetitive paragraph that drags the whole essay down. The honest answer is that 'five' is a ceiling and a prompt, not a quota: three or four genuinely distinct, well-evidenced points beat five where the last two overlap. Quality of distinctness, not the count, is what the structure is really protecting.
Templates can read as mechanical, and examiners notice a paint-by-numbers essay.
A visibly formulaic essay (axis, evidence, repeat) can feel airless and lose the spark of real argument. The rebuttal is that the method is internal scaffolding the reader should never see: the seams are hidden by varied sentence openings, genuine engagement with the counter-case, and a voice that sounds like a person thinking. Structure should be felt as clarity, not seen as a template.
The argument, step by step
- Read all three prompts quickly and pick the one where you can name five distinct points fastest; the best prompt is the one you can plan, not the one you find most interesting.
- Spend about five minutes planning: paraphrase the prompt in your own words, write down its hidden assumption, and commit to a one-sentence thesis (ideally qualified).
- Map the prompt onto five axes (ethical, legal/political, economic, social, philosophical) and label one distinct point per axis, discarding any that overlap.
- Attach a single evidence cue to each point (a thinker, an example, a statute, a statistic) so each paragraph has an anchor before you start writing.
- Write the introduction (about 80-100 words): paraphrase, assumption, thesis, and a one-line signpost of the points to come.
- Write each body paragraph (about 110-130 words): open by saying how this point differs from the last, make the claim, explain it, deploy the one anchor, and link back to the thesis.
- Devote one paragraph to the strongest objection: state it at full strength, then dismantle its hinge and show why your stance survives.
- Write the conclusion (about 60-80 words): synthesise the points, restate the thesis once, and add no new material; leave two minutes to proof-read for the one absolute word or unsupported leap that drags the essay down.
The model plan
Worked example prompt (paraphrased): should a university education be free at the point of use, funded by the taxpayer rather than the student? Stance: no to blanket free tuition, but fully free for the poorest and income-contingent for the rest. Intro (~90 words): paraphrase; flag the assumption ('free' is a misnomer because graduates still pay through later taxes, the real question is who bears the cost); thesis; signpost. Point 1 - ethical axis: education is a partly private investment, not a pure public right, so the beneficiary should contribute; anchor: the graduate-earnings premium. Point 2 - legal/political axis: the social contract obliges the state to guarantee access, not to subsidise the future high-earner; anchor: Article 2 of Protocol 1 ECHR guarantees a right to education, not free university. Point 3 - economic axis: blanket free tuition is regressive because it transfers from non-graduate taxpayers to graduates who will out-earn them; anchor: the IFS finding on who gains. Point 4 - social axis: income-contingent repayment, with no upfront fee, protects access better than headline 'free' that crowds out places; anchor: participation rose after 2012 fees, not fell. Point 5 - philosophical axis: Rawls's difference principle justifies subsidising the least well-off but not the affluent graduate; Nozick warns against forced redistribution to those who freely chose a profitable degree. Counter (steel-manned): fees deter the poorest and entrench inequality; rebuttal: that is an argument for means-tested free tuition and grants, which my stance includes, not for blanket abolition that subsidises the rich. Conclusion (~70 words): synthesise the five axes, restate the qualified thesis, no new material.
The model essay
The question is usually put as whether university should be 'free', but that word hides the real issue. No university is free; the cost is simply shifted from the student to the general taxpayer. So the honest version of the prompt is this: should a graduate, who will on average out-earn a non-graduate for life, pay for their own degree, or should a cleaner who never went to university pay for it through taxes? Put that way, my answer is that blanket free tuition is the wrong reform. The state should guarantee that no one is priced out, fully funding the poorest, while everyone else repays through an income-contingent system. I defend this on five distinct grounds.
The first is ethical. A degree is not a pure public good like clean air; it is also a private investment that raises the holder's lifetime earnings. Where a benefit is largely captured by an individual, it is fair that the individual contributes to its cost. This is not to deny education's public value, but to insist that the beneficiary share the bill they will profit from.
The second ground is legal and political, and it is distinct because it concerns what the state actually owes its citizens rather than what is fair between them. The social contract, and the right to education in Article 2 of the First Protocol to the European Convention, guarantees access to education, not a free university place for all. The state's duty is to remove barriers, which a no-upfront-fee, income-contingent loan does, not to write a blank cheque to future high earners.
The third ground is economic, and unlike the ethical point it is about distribution across society rather than fairness to the individual. Blanket free tuition is quietly regressive. It is paid for by all taxpayers, including the majority who never graduate, and the gains flow disproportionately to graduates who will earn more than those funding them. The Institute for Fiscal Studies has repeatedly shown that abolishing fees would benefit higher-earning graduates most. A targeted system spends public money where it changes lives, on the poorest, rather than subsidising the comfortable.
The fourth ground is social, and it answers the access worry head-on rather than restating fairness. The fear is that charging fees shuts out poorer students. The English evidence cuts the other way: after fees rose in 2012, participation among disadvantaged students did not collapse but continued to climb, because repayment is income-contingent and there is nothing to pay upfront. A headline of 'free' can in fact cap the number of funded places, rationing access, whereas a loan-funded system can expand it.
The fifth ground is philosophical, and it differs from the economic point by asking what justice requires rather than what the numbers show. Rawls's difference principle permits inequalities only where they help the least well-off; that justifies fully funding the poorest student, but not subsidising the affluent one. Nozick adds the opposite caution: forcing taxpayers to fund the freely chosen, profitable degree of another is a hard interference with their property. Between these poles sits a means-tested middle that both can accept.
The strongest objection must be faced squarely: that any fee, however deferred, deters the very poorest and entrenches inequality, so only abolition guarantees fair access. I concede the risk is real and central. But it is an argument for the targeted half of my position, generous maintenance grants and fully free tuition for low-income students, not for blanket abolition. Making university free for everyone spends the most money on those who need it least, and so does less for access than a system that aims its support at the bottom.
On each of five distinct axes, then, ethical, legal, economic, social and philosophical, the case points the same way. University should not be free for all, because 'free' subsidises the future high earner at the expense of the cleaner who never went. It should instead be free for those who could not otherwise come, and income-contingent for the rest, a settlement that protects access without rewarding the already advantaged.
Authorities worth knowing
First Protocol to the European Convention on Human Rights, Article 2
ETS No 9, Article 2 of Protocol No 1 (1952), given effect in UK law by the Human Rights Act 1998, Schedule 1
Guarantees that no person shall be denied the right to education; the Strasbourg case law (Belgian Linguistic case (1968)) reads this as a right of access to existing educational institutions, not a right to free higher education, which is exactly the distinction a free-tuition essay must draw.
Belgian Linguistic Case (No 2)
(1968) 1 EHRR 252 (European Court of Human Rights)
The right to education under Article 2 of Protocol 1 is a right of effective access to the educational institutions that exist, not a positive obligation on the state to establish or fund any particular kind of education; a useful authority for separating 'access' from 'free'.
How the law frames it
United Kingdom
In England, tuition is funded by income-contingent loans rather than upfront fees: graduates repay a percentage of income above a threshold, and unpaid balances are eventually written off, so the system is closer to a graduate tax than to a market price. Scotland funds tuition for Scottish-domiciled undergraduates, which makes the four nations a live comparative example of the same policy choice. The right to education exists via the Human Rights Act 1998 (Article 2 of Protocol 1), but it guarantees access, not free university, which is the precise line a strong essay draws.
Canada
Canada has no free undergraduate tuition; provinces set fees and operate loan and grant schemes, so the Canadian model resembles a mixed system of fees softened by means-tested support. It is a useful comparator for the 'targeted, not blanket' stance, showing that wide access is pursued through grants to the disadvantaged rather than universal abolition of fees.
ECHR
The European Convention protects a right to education under Article 2 of Protocol 1, but the Strasbourg jurisprudence (the Belgian Linguistic case) reads it as a right of access to the institutions that exist, not a positive duty to provide free higher education. For Section B this is the key move: a human-rights framing supports universal access and non-discrimination, but it does not by itself dictate that university must be free.
Counter-arguments and how to defeat them
Counter. A five-point template makes essays mechanical and formulaic, and examiners penalise paint-by-numbers writing that lacks genuine thought.
Rebuttal. The structure is internal scaffolding the reader should never see. Distinct axes guarantee coverage, but the seams are hidden by varied openings, honest engagement with the counter-case, and a voice that reads like a person reasoning. Clarity of structure and freshness of expression are not in tension; the template buys you the time to sound natural.
Counter. Planning for five minutes wastes time better spent writing, since the essay is short and the clock is tight.
Rebuttal. The opposite is true under pressure: a five-minute skeletal plan prevents the mid-essay drift and repetition that cost far more than five minutes to fix. The plan is the essay; once thesis, five labelled points and one evidence cue each are down, the writing is fast because every decision is already made.
Counter. Insisting on five distinct points forces filler on narrow prompts that only really support three good arguments.
Rebuttal. Five is a ceiling, not a quota. The rule that protects quality is distinctness, not the count: three or four genuinely separate, well-evidenced axes always beat five where the last two overlap. Drop any point you cannot make distinct, and spend the words deepening the ones that survive.
Counter. Picking a stance in the first two minutes risks committing to a position you later realise is weak, with no time to change course.
Rebuttal. A qualified thesis ('yes, but only where...') is built precisely to absorb this: it bakes the strongest concession into the stance from the outset, so the steel-manned objection strengthens rather than topples it. The candidate who fears commitment ends up fence-sitting, which is the one outcome the LNAT reliably marks down.
Counter. Section B is not a knowledge test, so deploying authorities or statistics is showing off and can backfire if a citation is wrong.
Rebuttal. One precise anchor per point is not showing off; it is the difference between assertion and argument, and it signals the range admissions tutors screen for. The discipline is to cite only what you are sure of and to use the example for its reasoning, not its prestige; a half-remembered case is best replaced by a clear everyday example.
Conclusion
Planning the argument is the whole game in Section B. Spend five minutes, not fifteen: paraphrase the prompt, name its hidden assumption, commit to a qualified thesis, and lock down up to five points on genuinely distinct axes, ethical, legal, economic, social and philosophical, with one anchor each. Then steel-man the strongest objection and answer it. Do that and the writing becomes transcription, the essay reads as a person reasoning rather than a template, and you land a clear verdict in 40 minutes. The count is a ceiling, distinctness is the rule, and the fence is the one place never to sit.
Evidence you can cite
- The Institute for Fiscal Studies found that scrapping tuition fees would disproportionately benefit higher-earning graduates, who repay the most under the income-contingent system, making blanket free tuition a regressive use of public money compared with targeted support.Institute for Fiscal Studies, analysis of higher education funding and the distributional effects of abolishing tuition fees — source
- The entry rate to higher education for 18-year-olds from the most disadvantaged areas in England rose after the 2012 increase in tuition fees rather than falling, undercutting the assumption that upfront-free, income-contingent fees deter the poorest from applying.UCAS End of Cycle reports and Office for Students widening-participation data on POLAR/disadvantaged entry rates — source
Further reading
- George Orwell, 'Politics and the English Language' - the model for clarity and for destroying waffle, the exact tone Section B rewards.
- John Stuart Mill, On Liberty, chapter 2 - sustained argumentative reasoning and the steel-manning of opposing views.
- John Rawls, A Theory of Justice - the difference principle, a reusable anchor for any distributive-fairness prompt.
- Robert Nozick, Anarchy, State, and Utopia - the libertarian objection to forced redistribution, the natural counterweight to Rawls.
- Jonathan Swift, 'A Modest Proposal' - structured argument and controlled tone under a fixed thesis.