The recent spat in the NUS over Islamic State is indicative of the political disorientation of the student movement, writes Charles Gradnitzer In July, Alliance for Workers’ Liberty member Dan Cooper brought a motion headed ‘Iraqi/Kurdish solidarity’ to the National Union of Students national executive council.1 The motion, which sought to “condemn the IS and support the ...
Communist Students were stirring things up at this year's conference of the National Union of Students Members and supporters of Communist Students made a stand for principled Marxist politics at the 2014 conference of the National Union of Students, where CS member Robert Hayes was standing for the ‘block of 15’ individually elected members of the executive. The ...
Communist Students member Robert Eagleton outlines the platform he is standing on for the National Union of Students ‘Block of 15’ From April 8 to 10 students from across Britain will gather in Liverpool for the annual conference of the National Union of Students. This year, comrades in Communist Students have decided to stand me as ...
Last week saw an outbreak of student protest. Daniel Harvey reports The sudden re-ignition of student protest on campuses began on December 5, when students from the University of London began an occupation of Senate House Library in Bloomsbury. A set of demands blasted the “undemocratic and unaccountable” university management, and announced the solidarity of the ...
Callum Williamson on the offensive against university workers and students The strike action taking place in universities across the UK this week follows the refusal of the University and Colleges Employers Association (UCEA) to resume national negotiations with Unite, Unison, the University and College Union, the Educational Institute of Scotland and the GMB (the last two ...
The National Union of Students no-platforms George Galloway, Galloway sues the NUS, the left talks nonsense throughout and Paul Demarty wonders what the hell is going on A sad truth about today’s left is that it is pretty irrational, all told. Normally this irrationality comes out in more or less disguised form: the standard practice, adopted ...
From the National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts The National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts is calling for a National Student Strike this March, in support of a nationwide strike on pensions by the lecturers’ union, UCU, and coinciding with an official walk-out called by the National Union of Students. A date will be announced later this week, ...
Cat Rylance on the tumultuous protests that shook British society last year Around this time last year, school, college and university students were preparing for the opening blow of the Conservative-Liberal Democrat attacks on public services. These attacks were met with a level of resistance not seen for decades. Walkouts, occupations and mass demonstrations mobilised hundreds ...
With the RMT and TSSA moving towards a merger, Chris Strafford calls for democratic unity from below in the workers' movement (first published here) “While the railway companies are thus combining their forces, and consolidating their interests, railwaymen have allowed their forces to be split into innumerable sections ...”[1] This warning comes from the May 1911 ...
Ben Lewis looks forward to a bold show of mass opposition to austerity on June 30 (first published in the Weekly Worker) On Tuesday May 24 the consultancy firm, MM&K, and the electronic voting agency, Manifest, published a report which exposed the harsh reality and twisted logic of capitalism in crisis. At a time ...
The defeat of Clare Solomon offers us a snapshot of the student movement, argues Ben Lewis. First published in the Weekly Worker. Elections can be used as a barometer of the class struggle and an insight into the health of our own forces. Notwithstanding the peculiar dynamics within the world of student politics, this ...
Ben Lewis reports on a promising weekend of student action and plans for the battles ahead. If one image best summarises the radical transformation of the student movement within the last year, it is that of a rather concerned policeman escorting the supine National Union of Students president, Aaron Porter, from last Saturday's ...
CS members Alfred Stevens originally wrote this for 'The Commune' website. The 1,200 striking workers at Europe’s biggest food manufacturing plant, the Heinz factory in Kitt Green of Wigan, suffered the first defeat in their ongoing struggle against the management and owners of the company, as the senior stewards decided to call off the 24 hour ...