The University of Plymouth Students Union has taken up the initiative on fighting for student funding, by holding the first demonstration of the year at their City site in Plymouth on 30th September, whilst we wait for the NUS National demonstration (remember you saw it here first) on Wednesday 4th December but the wait for the National 'mass' lobby of parliament will be only until 23rd October. The Plymouth demo, held at one of the university's smaller sites attracted over 200 students, despite the date in question being the first day of lectures. The demo had the theme of the death of free education and students walked through the town heads bowed and to a single tolling drum beat, in silence with everyone in single file behind the grim reaper. This got a great deal of attention on the streets of Devon, as did the usual shouting and songs that accompanied the rally at the end.
A group of Irish students barricaded themselves inside the headquarters of the country's Department of Education in protest against 'third level' fees. Supporters later waited outside as the police tried to negotiate a settlement with protesters. President of Union of Students in Ireland (USI), Colm Jordan said they would remain in the building until they received a commitment that an official report, which called for greater access to higher education, would be implemented;
"We are looking for the full and total implementation of the Action Group on Access to Third Level Education. This was an expert group which sat down well over a year ago that came up with the route map to increased participation in this country for poorer students, students with disabilities and mature students."
Unlike in the UK, where just Plymouth so far are being proactive, USI are showing what a national union can do and are leading the way in the fight for a fairer deal for students, and they warned of virulent opposition to the plans to reintroduce fees in the Republic. In the end, the seven students from Trinity College, UCD, DIT and Maynooth who had made it all the way to the boardroom of the Department of Education in Dublin were removed by Police. They would have had to wait for a while though as the man they wanted to see, Minister for Education, Noel Dempsey, was on a week long visit to Thailand and Malaysia.
Stop Press! Irish students 'well pissed off' as revolt escalates
There was also a protest in Livingston recently as staff and students from West Lothian College are took to the streets in a protest against 13 job cuts. The march was organised by staff at the college amid concerns that the 13 proposed job losses in language department, IT, marketing, digital art will just be the first cuts of staff numbers. Joe McCusker, chair of the EIS union at the college said;
"We have increased productivity at the college, in terms of student numbers and class sizes, by 25 per cent, and yet people are still facing redundancy. The number of people applying for courses shows there is a clear need for places and training, especially in the light of closures at Motorola and the like. It is unfair on West Lothian to cut the resources being put into the college, as well as being unfair on the staff concerned."
The sad fact is that probably more students turned out for both the Countryside Alliances' Liberty & Livelihood march and the Stop the War demo over the last two weekends than have turned out for an NUS fees or grants protest for over thirty years. Organisers of both claimed around 400,000 protesters, and whilst organisers of the countryside march estimated around 5-10% were students, the anti-war protest claimed almost one in five were students - a minimum of 20,000, with an unsure maximum of 80,000. Although the Countryside march captured the media spotlight, the anti-war demo was strangely overlooked in comparison. Ian Henshall, chair of INK, the umbrella group for the UK's alternative media said;
"Yesterday's rally of up to 450,000 people was the biggest peace march in Britain for a generation, possibly since the great anti-nazi mobilisations of the 1930's. However it was barely mentioned today by the BBC and Britain's mostly pro-war print media. According to police estimates the march was more than six times larger than a similar one last autumn, but it has received less coverage in the UK media at a time when the Bush/Iraq issue is at the top of the global agenda. This obvious news manipulation has not deceived many here, as the news is slipping out on less-controlled non-news programmes."
"The BBC, known here as the Blair Broadcasting Corporation, is under pressure
directly from Blair who shamelessly appointed Labour donors to top
positions. It is also strongly under the influence of the pro-Likud lobby
and widely perceived as anti-Palestinian. In the 1980's the BBC was exposed as having an MI5 office in the building which vetted promotions of staff."
Anti-War Links
Camsaw, follow links for 'alternative dossier'
On Line Journal
Spin on This
Counter Punch
UK media workers against the war
Unanswered Questions
Infowars
From the Wilderness
Emperors Clothes
Golbal research
The memory Hole, An archive of stories
that have run once and once only
Stop the war
The Student Union at the University of East Anglia got a taste of the press reaction that NUS's drinking campaign got, when their protest about the removal of freshers week attracted headline of work-shy students. More than 1,000 students at UEA signed a petition complaining that first years no longer have a week to settle in before lectures started. Although Ned Glasier, UEA Communications Officer insisted that: "It is not about students wanting more time to go drinking. People coming to university need time to settle in before getting down to studying. A lot of people have left home for the first time, they are 18, they might not have cooked for themselves before or lived on their own.", the press seized on the story with headlines like students "Fight for the right to party"
Forget the A-level scandal and the calls for Estelle Morris' resignation, David Blunkett is lucky he got promoted, because if he was still education secretary, he would have had to resign last week anyway. Blunkett had said that if this years SAT results for 11 year olds did not hit 75% for Maths & 80% for English this year he'd quit. The results were 71% & 75%. At the time he said:
"If I signally fail, I've indicated time and time again that I accept that that rests with me and my team. I don't know of any other government ever, or any other secretary of state across the world, who has put their neck on the block in this way."
Well maybe there's another somewhere who knew he wouldn't be in the job by the deadline….
There won't be a HE lecturers strike this term after all, unless you are in London. Unions representing academic Higher Education staff in UK have "reluctantly" accepted the employers' offer of a 3.5% pay increase for 2002-3 along with performance related bonuses. In a joint statement, the unions said:
" A 3.5% increase does not begin to resolve the problem of low pay for lecturers and it will not solve the crisis of staff recruitment and retention in UK universities. It fails to address the recommendations for pay rises in the Bett Report. This inadequate offer has been accepted with great reluctance by members in the knowledge that many HE institutions had severe funding problems this year. However, given the government's commitment in the CSR to an 18% increase in education spending over a 3 year period, the failure to fund pay increases this year will raise expectations that significant increases must be forthcoming soon. The government must deliver."
But lecturers are to be balloted for industrial action over London allowances, as vice-chancellors are refusing to offer any increases to their staff.
Private schools may lose their charitable status unless they can show they benefited the public due to recommendations in a report by Tony Blairs strategy unit. At the moment schools obtain charitable status if they are for the "advancement of education", but under the biggest shake up of charity law for 400 years they would have to show public benefit, which could mean opening up facilities to the local community. How the changes may affect the quasi-charitable status of Students' Unions is as yet unknown. The report now goes for a three month consultation, with any reduction in charitable status netting a tax bonus for the treasury. Tony Blair said;
"Much of the legal context for charity and voluntary action is outdated. In some areas excessive red tape is preventing the sector from fulfilling its potential. And sometimes the rules risk undermining public confidence."
NUS President Mandy Telford had an on-line chat the other day. To see it, Click here
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