hope against hope: a necessary betrayal

Nic Beuret reflects on the deeper meaning of the recent student protests

What has been taken from them to make them so angry? Hope, that’s what. Hope, and the fragile bubble of social aspiration that sustained us through decades of mounting inequality; hope and the belief that if we worked hard and did as we were told and bought the right things, some of us at least would get the good jobs and safe places to live that we’d been promised.

– Laurie Penny, New Statesman

A single image from a day of movement marks out competing visions of hope. A boot through a Millbank window fed the dreams of resistance that many in the Left have been craving since talk of austerity started. The same boot posed a question that plays out in the university occupations that preceded it and have since blossomed in its wake: what is it exactly that we are hoping for?

on violence against the police

by a participant in the Parliament Square demonstrations

The condemnations are as predictable as they are boring.  The public-school educated Sun hacks, who write like some coked up parodies of proletarian semi-literacy, refer to “louts” and “hooligans”.  The Daily Mail complains about someone urinating against Churchill’s statue, and the Telegraph is dismayed that Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall were “attacked”.  Probably by a “baying mob”.  Meanwhile, someone in a moustache on The Guardian talks about how, no doubt, this will provide a “distraction” from the “real issues”, whose repetition ad nauseam presumably has some intrinsic value for the solemn liberal contingent.

I can’t even be bothered to look up the precise terms of the condemnation this time.  It’s always the same.  A dash of the royal family, veneration for some long dead racist, shakes of the head from the banal but well intentioned.  Is anyone still listening?  Haven’t we read all this before?

keep up the fight!

A leaflet given out by The Commune on Thursday’s fees demo in London

Today is the fourth major day of action against the government’s attack on education.

Much about this movement has been new and original, and that can only be a good thing. The aspiring politicians who lead NUS have been swept aside.

We have stood up for ourselves in spite of media condemnation. The protests and occupations have benefited from being lively and spontaneous. While suited NUS leaders wanted to debate politicians on friendly terms in TV studios, the movement has shown real militancy and anger at this government of millionaires trying to screw us over.

LSE occupies against fee rises and cuts

David Broder writes on this week’s student protests in London

a teach-in launched the LSE occupation

Tuesday 30th saw the latest major student protest against the planned attacks on further and higher education, the ConDem coalition planning to cut Education Maintenance Allowance and raise fees to as much as £9,000 a year.

civil disobedience in manchester against education cuts

Mark Harrison writes his personal recollections of today’s great events in Manchester as part of the national day of action against tuition fees.

Student Protest, scaling new heights.

Fortunately today I slept in and missed my 11am lecture and decided to go to what I expected to be a piddly little demo.

What a pleasant surprise awaited me! By 12:30 approximately 3000 people had gathered at the designated meeting point at the University of Manchester, these were not the usual faces. The vast majority of those present were college and school students playing truant, many had travelled from Cheshire, ‘the left’ was completely swamped, The SWP had made an obvious effort to mobilise all their members, there were a few members of the Revolutionary Communist Group, a guy from the Alliance for Workers’ Liberty and a comrade of the Anarchist Federation distributing Anarchist Student. The militancy on display was inspiring. Despite being promised on social networking websites that we would be marching to the town hall, the consensus loving, ultra democratic officers of the University’s Student Union had apparently decided that we would instead be diverted to the Castlefield arena on the edge of the city, out of harms way. I think ‘health and safety’ was the reason given – political correctness gone mad!

the battle of millbank and occupation at manchester university

The mass media may have already covered yesterday’s demo in London but a personal account can never be a bad thing.

The NUS and police were completely unprepared for the 50,000 angry students who descended on Central London. The demonstration was completely chaotic, people were travelling in all directions, hand made placards ranged from the uninspired ‘keep the cap’, the “hilarious” (David Cameron engaging in anal sex with Nick Clegg), to the visionary “University for Everyone”. Finding the much discussed ‘free education bloc’ was an impossibility, let along finding your own comrades.

occupation at manchester

Personally, direction was only given to the demonstration when a NUS steward said to me, “Don’t go off the right, that’s Tory HQ, carry on forward for the NUS route”. It seems that great minds think alike as most chose to ignore the mind numbing speeches made by NUS and UCU tops and aimed for the headquarters of the traditional party of the bourgeoisie.

the educator, issue 1

This morning members of Communist Students and students and staff from Manchester’s universities distributed the first issue of The Educator. Click below to see the PDF.

One activist reports that they gave out 300 copies within only an hour and plan another print run. They are looking for more people to get involved: ring 07976386737 or email info@communiststudents.org.uk for details.

what resistance to education cuts?

Mark Harrison presents his personal recollections of Sunday’s Education Activist Network Conference and his thoughts on the student left.

So I went to this Education Activist Network (EAN) conference on Sunday. I am glad that I went, as it was better than I expected and actually invigorated me to return to my campus filled with new ideas for action, although the Socialist Workers Party continues to disappoint me.

progress for UCL cleaners campaign

Greg Brown reports on a recent success for the Living Wage campaign at University College London

Most cleaners are currently paid at or just above the National Minimum Wage. It is probably fair to say the average pay is just £6/hour. We are not aware that any cleaner receives sick pay, nor any kind of pension rights. Holiday leave is at the statutory minimum.

Some cleaners have reported that they have friends who have been intimidated in the workplace with their immigration status. I don’t want to go into any more detail given the sensitivity of the issue, but anyone who knows anything about the industry wouldn’t be surprised by the sort of things reported to us. It’s all disgusting but very textbook stuff.

UCL has now promised to pay staff the London Living Wage (LLW) as contracts “crystallise” – i.e. when they end and come up for renewal. Although we are told this is something that will be honoured irrespective of the forthcoming funding cuts, this is the most they have so far committed to.

demo in solidarity with UCL cleaners, 28th september

A call-out from activists at University College London. See here for an Evening Standard report on the cleaners.

At UCL most cleaning services and all catering services are outsourced. A number of different contracts currently exist, with varying employment terms for cleaners specifically.

All outsourced cleaning staff, of which we estimate there to be around 180, receive well below the London Living Wage – many are on £6/hour, while others are on the National Minimum Wage of £5.80.

‘unviable’ courses thanks to MMU cuts

by Mark Harrison

In November 2009, the management of Manchester Metropolitan University announced plans to shed 127 members of ‘support staff’ from their workforce; this follows a period of manifest ‘natural wastage’, which has left the library devoid of staff. Amongst students, those of the flagship art department will be hardest hit. Artists have complained that their courses will become ‘unviable’ with the loss of technicians and studio time.

The UNISON branch secretary made a firm verbal attack against management, highlighting the Vice Chancellor John Brooks’ £250,000 annual salary and the 7% increase in his pay packet as well as the development of new sites by the university, a £1.3 million budget surplus for the year 2009-10 and the fact that the cuts were announced before Alistair Darling’s 2010 budget. The union called for a vote of no-confidence in the VC whilst condemning a growth in the number of highly paid managers and “years of mismanagement”.

lessons of the middlesex occupation

A Middlesex student looks at the recent student occupation in protest at the closure of the philosophy department

The timing of the Middlesex occupation  – during the general election, and so just before major cuts across the  country – means that it is particularly important to draw lessons from it. A group of us are in the process of collaboratively writing up our experiences for the benefit of future occupations. However, this has not yet been completed, so what follows is simply a personal and partial account of some of the positives and negatives of the occupation.

The best thing about the occupation – which lasted for twelve days and covered a whole building – was that it proved how much a small number of people can do if they have the energy and the will. Because the occupation was a response to the closure of the philosophy department, most involved were philosophy students, and many were part-time and postgraduates, who hardly knew each other beyond the occasional confused questions in weekly seminars. We started with forty people, although numbers varied because of people’s work and other commitments.

end of the middlesex uni occupation

by Sebastian Wright

Today was meant to be a talk by Tariq Ali at the ‘Transversal Space’ of occupied Mansion House, Middlesex University. Instead of a lecture, however, people arrived to discover that the whole building had been surrounded by security guards. An injunction had been served to the occupiers by university management, and individual students had been named in the document.

These tactics obviously worked, because after holding the entire building for a week, the occupiers decided to leave as a group—using Ali’s talk outside on the lawn as the focus for a post-occupation rally.

middlesex occupation escalates

Sebastian Wright reports on the occupation of Middlesex University in the fight against the closure of its Philosophy Department

Yesterday marked the second day of the Middlesex occupation at Trent Park. Some stayed at the occupation of the Dean’s boardroom, whilst others fanned out across the other campuses at Hendon and Cathill to canvass support. At Hendon there was a surprising amount of security. It was not clear whether this had anything to do specifically with our campaign, or not, but there was certainly a degree of paranoia there. Reception refused to point us in the direction of the Dean’s office, and security guards (about 8 of them in one building!) were checking every ID.

When we finally found what appeared the directorate’s corridor, it was not, then, shocking to discover that it not only had a keypad entry security system in place, but also a privately contracted security guard permanently positioned on the door. If nothing else it goes to show the estrangement of management in universities from their own students and staff when they feel the need to lock themselves away behind multiple levels of security provision.