return to Uni for the 2nd time and spend the next 4 years on a PPE degree, so that I'm equipped to engage in the political system (broken though it is) and hopefully play some small but meaningful part in actually doing something about it.

You have my up-vote for this. I'm currently kind of doing the opposite. I got a Master's in Psycho- and Sociolinguistics and now I'm studying computer science. I used to work for a politician during an election campaign to help shaping his linguistic profile (I guess you can call it the ethos part among pathos and logos...). For the time being I'm working as a translator for the Govt. That said, been over a year and - frankly - it took me only a couple of weeks to become an even bigger cynic than I already was (and I thought that wasn't possible anymore...) because:

It seems to me that democracy is being perverted to work in the interests of certain privileged groups, rather than do what it's supposed to do:

that's pretty much what I observe all the time. We get to see some internal documents in their first version before they get released to the public and their final version (once they get released) is quite often pretty hilarious...everybody is just looking out for themselves and of course, the corporate interests...it's money this, money that...and of course the question: who gets to be in charge (aka power).

So, from my perspective, the political side started to look pretty bleak. But then I started to look at it a bit differently: at the end of the day, I would never wanna trade with one of this poor suckers. Chasing after money and power is such a futile endeavor - everything is fake (the countless speeches we have to recycle for these politicians: same content with different names and locations) and the moment they get what they want it's "so long suckers". Sure, not everyone is this that morally corrupt, but you can have the best intentions; if you don't play by the rules, you won't go far (just reminds me of how great The Wire was...).

With all that being said, I still think your endeavor is a worthy one! Someone has to make the first step. As for me, I might give it a shot in education after completing my next degree. Who knows...but not to make it too far off topic: I'll teach them how to use Linux ;)