First of all, thanks to those of you who have expressed your opinions so far.
To be honest I had never really been too keen on getting a degree anyway. A lot of my friends who are older than me have been dropping out of uni like flies because either the work is too hard or their course is not as relevant as it may have seemed at first. I wouldn't want to make the same mistake.
I have good grades from school (six 1s two 2s at standard grade, four As and a B at Higher), but my main motivation was and always has been flying.
However, at the stage I am at just now a simple need to fly can't take the place of hard reality, and PP confirmed what I had suspected for a long time: this is a heavily saturated market.
So instead of taking four years out and getting a degree I've just sent my application away to NATS to become an ATCO. I have always been very interested in this career path anyway, and I'm
sure it would be an excellent job in it's own right.
If I can make it into ATC then I will be more than happy, and in a few years time, if I still feel the burning desire to fly commercially, and assuming the market has picked up, then yes, I may go for the ATPL.
However, a career in aviation is to me a helluva lot better than any other job I can think of, and ATC would be right up my street, so, unless any MAJOR changes come about again within the next few months, it looks like I'll be putting the flying career on hold.
Any further opinions would be welcome.