Change the world!

 

ISR/Socialist Students conference 2006

Change the world!

THE INTERNATIONAL Socialist Resistance (ISR)/ Socialist Students
conference on 4 March 2006 was a vital conference for every young person
who wants to fight to change the world. Reports on the conference will
follow. The following was written before the event.

The opening Fight for our future! rally has guest speakers from the
Bolivia Solidarity Campaign, the national convenor of the PCS union’s
youth network (personal capacity) and the Jean Charles de Menezes
campaign as well as speakers from ISR and Socialist Students.

Sessions include:

  • Latin America – a continent in revolt. What are the lessons for
    the struggle in Britain?
  • The fight for our rights at work.
  • What is socialism?
  • Sexism – what it is and how to fight it.
  • What is the solution to the problems of Iraq and what is the
    way forward for the anti-war movement?
  • Why it’s a crime to be young in Blair’s Britain and what can we
    do about it?
  • The struggle for free education in universities and colleges.
  • No to racism!
  • Why do socialists talk about the working class?

Closing rally on:

  • Do you want to change the world?

Come to the ISR/ Socialist Students conference Saturday 4 March,
10am – 5pm. Conway Hall, Red Lion Square, London WC1 (nearest tube
Holborn). Tickets £3 or £5.

Get active and get organised with ISR and Socialist Students.

020 8558 7947

www.socialiststudents.org.uk

www.anticapitalism.org.uk


Students’ struggles

Sussex: Students march for their future

UNIVERSITY OF Sussex students demonstrated against the lack of
lectures and seminars, books and food provision at their university on
16 February.

Richard Mullin, University of Sussex Socialist Students

This demonstration demands included: a minimum of eight taught hours
per week for every student on every course; no more rent rises beyond
inflation; a canteen serving a variety of healthy food in the evening;
and also no introduction of top-up fees.

The demo was called in the name of an official student union campaign
‘Sort US (i.e. the University of Sussex) Out’. However members of
Socialist Students set the date, decided the demands, produced and
distributed the publicity and rallied the troops with only occasional
(but much-appreciated) help from elsewhere.

We took every available opportunity to publicise our cause, including
the annual elections for full time (‘sabbatical’) posts in the union.
Most candidates for sabbaticals pledged in words to support our
campaign, though far fewer showed up to the demo. We approached the more
co-operative candidates with a petition stating the demo’s demands,
which we asked them to use and build up as part of their election
campaign, with some success.

We also produced 3,500 copies of a ‘Sort US Out’ newsletter written
primarily by Socialist Students members. The result should be a
sabbatical team that will continue to be sympathetic to campaigning
activities next year.

However, the support we receive from the union tops is passive or
even obstructive. One of the so-called leaders of the ‘Sort US Out’
campaign tried to prevent us from contacting the local press saying it
would damage the university’s reputation.

We don’t care if this stops applicants wanting to come here – they
have a right to know what kind of service they are getting in advance.
University of Sussex is, for many students a dire place to study.

Socialist Students will take the campaign forward by linking the
demo’s demands to the NUS conference delegate elections. We’re standing
three candidates and each will use the petition as did the best
sabbatical candidates a few weeks ago.

We also need a leaflet on the AUT strike taking place shortly, and we
aim to produce a third issue of the newsletter. There is also talk of
another demo before the end of term – Socialist Students will campaign
energetically for this.


Hungry students fight profit hungry corporations

FOLLOWING THE great example of Lambeth College, (see the socialist,
425) Socialist Students at Exeter University are campaigning against the
privatisation and sub-contracting of canteens to private companies.

Jim Thompson, Exeter Socialist Students

All eating establishments in Cornwall House, one of Exeter’s union
buildings, are sub-contacted to Scolarest, a company that is part of the
Compass Group multinational. Scolarest’s appalling record includes
feeding school children too much salt, sugar and fats through their
monopoly control over many schools’ food production.

Celebrity chef Jamie Oliver had exposed their "profits over
health" attitude. So you can imagine Exeter students’ reaction when
they realised that this monstrous company were producing food for
canteens which many students and staff rely upon.

Scolarest use their monopoly in Exeter to put up prices while
compromising on choice and quality. They have also attacked their
staffs’ working conditions and pensions. Sub-contracting of canteens is
just part of the broad neo-liberal sweep into education which forces
universities, schools and colleges to be run like businesses.

In Exeter this meant closing the chemistry and music departments,
raising catered hall rents to £140 a week, the planned privatisation of
halls of residence and the ruthless restrictive sponsorship of failing
departments by big business – which effectively gives private companies
a stranglehold over departments, telling them what to teach in exchange
for much-needed finance.

Together with the £3,000 top-up fees to be charged next year, this
commercialisation of our education effectively denies students from
working-class backgrounds the right to a free, decent education.

In Exeter we already have a lot of support. So far the campaign has
included doing a stall every day, linking up with the TGWU union,
collecting names on a petition and handing out our literature putting
forward a socialist perspective.

Our motion, calling for a mass campaign against Scolarest and
expensive food, was passed in the Guild (our students’ union) General
Meeting. Now we can build the campaign even bigger involving mass
meetings, a boycott of Cornwall House and the drive to get 2,000
signatures on our petition.

Isolated campaigns such as these cannot reverse the neo-liberalisation
of our education, but we can force vital concessions such as price
drops. We will also keep fighting for the democratic running of
universities under the control of students and staff to make sure that
education is for educating and not profit!


No cuts in Lambeth college

LAMBETH COLLEGE is to face up to £2.6 million in cuts. This will at
least mean 60 redundancies and dozens of vital courses will be shut.

Rob MacDonald – Lambeth College student president

The government plans to ‘prioritise’ courses for 16-19 year olds and
courses that will directly lead to employment. Lambeth College is hit
hard due to the community nature of many of its courses. Courses in
English as a second language and other vital community-based courses
will be severely attacked.

A campaign to defeat the cuts must be called to include all college
unions but also importantly the wider community who will in the long
term be heavily affected by these cuts. The campaign is likely to
include strike action.