I live in Glasgow and Left College with a HNC in Computing, i ended up with a low level IT job in the NHS which is ok, you end up getting admin duties thrown in but its not bad experience.
If i'm brutally honest, if you have time and money i would go all the way. Loads of colleges offer good programming qualifications and really it will depend on what you want to do at the end up.
IT splits up into many different areas once the low level understanding comes. Programming can be shown in many different forms i.e p actual program programming using C++ and also Web developement using XML, ASP, PHP, CSS and Javascript.
With the way the market is going atm there is more demand for web developers and Network Engineers.
Having a decent level of knowledge in developement can earn you a great salary and equally an MCSE will to for networking, however, It is a very hard industry to compete in and you really need to stand out from the crowd.
Most employers are now looking for the qualification and relevant experience and with the developers side of things they want to see your work i.e recent websites and graphical work.
Have a look on www.S1jobs.com and choose IT/Communications just for an insight in what ppl are looking for.
Good luck