Coventry City Council now officially opposes top up fees thanks to a
motion successfully moved by Socialist Party councillors Karen McKay, Rob
Windsor and Dave Nellist on 16 December.
Rob Windsor sent us this report:
The council is under no overall control, with the
independent and Liberal Groups having two councillors each. Very unusually,
both they and the Tories supported the Socialist Party motion. This was
the second vote that the Socialist Party won after earlier moving an
amendment to temporarily halt cuts in Social Services in the city.
Despite colossal opposition and a developing revolt by
New Labour MPs, Coventry’s New Labour councillors tried in vain to defend
the indefensible.
Councillor Karen McKay moved the motion ramming home the
consequences of the chronic debt that faces graduates, citing the recent
poll in the Guardian showing 59% opposition to top up fees, and a letter in
the same paper that day from amongst others, the Vice Chancellor of Coventry
University, opposing top up fees.
Sham
Councillor Rob Windsor seconded the motion exposing the
Governments so called relief scheme as a sham. Students whose parents’
income is £30.000 or less will actually only get help with up
to the first £1125 of fees and then help only on a sliding scale.
Rob reminded councillors that virtually all New Labour
ministers had benefited from grant aided university education provided
through taxation and that Blair’s target of 50% going to university would
never come to pass with young people becoming terrified of chronic debt
thanks to fees.
Councillor Dave Nellist added that young people will
face more than three mortgages if this becomes law, one for a house, one for
debt accrued whilst in higher education and one through fees. It is also
clear that if minimum top up fees become law now there will be lobbying by
the wannabee "Ivy League" universities to hike them up later
creating a two tier system of higher education.
Hike
New Labour’s feeble defence was an amendment calling
on us to remove the reference to opposing top-up fees in exchange for talk
of support for a debate on the issue. They said that they wanted cash to be
used in Primary and Tertiary Education as a priority, but Dave Nellist
pointed out that if this was the case they are likely to be arguing for fees
and charges in these areas next.
Labour’s amendment was voted down and the Socialist
Party motion adopted. Naturally the Tories are not being honest in their
opposition. It was they who introduced student loans and contributed to
undefunding in higher education and no doubt they too would have considered
fees had they been in Government.
Nevertheless New Labour’s defeat will encourage greater
opposition and put more pressure on the city’s three New Labour MP’s to
oppose fees in Parliament.
The pressure on this issue is being built and
strengthened by International Socialist Resistance and the Socialist Party
who spent the days before the debate building support in both local
universities and three secondary schools.
Socialist Councillors will now demand that the council
acts on its new position and will use this victory in the council chamber to
help ensure that top up fees are defeated. Both by continuing to put on
pressure inside the council, but more importantly to build a bigger campaign
amongst students, Trades Unions and local communities outside as well.
Councillors nationally as well as MPs should be lobbied to take the same
position.
Socialist Party Motion
“This council opposes the Government’s plan to introduce top-up fees for students in Higher Education and calls on the City’s three local MP’s to oppose the plan in Parliament, believing that the combination of tuition fees and student loans will increasingly prove to be a barrier to less well-off applicants, and mean that young people will start their adult lives with crippling levels of debt”.
Passed 29 votes to 21 on a named vote
