Sinead Rylance surveys the current state of the student left.

After nearly a year of National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts (NCAFC), and with a year facing us that will prove to be very relevant to the group’s stated aims, it seems appropriate to look at their future and their effect on the student movement. NCAFC was set up in September/October 2009 by students from University College London (UCL) and since then has organised the event ‘Campaign against Fees and Cuts’ along with a number of, mainly London based, meetings attempting to organise students. Members of NCAFC prize it on being run by ‘independents’ (politically unaffiliated activists) but the influence of the Alliance for Worker’s Liberty (AWL) and Worker’s Power, is obvious, as each attempt to give direction to the group.

NCAFC has been involved in agitating around numerous student occupations including the high profile Middlesex and Sussex occupations earlier this year. The group also sent delegates to the June NUS cuts conference – originally open to all students who wished to attend, this was soon restricted to two delegates per university, which appeared to be because the bureaucracy realised the high number of activists from the student left that would be in attendance.
There appears to be two categories of main activists in NCAFC:  unaffiliated, independent students and university graduates from WP/AWL. Obviously, there are different views and opinions held by the different independents in the organisation on issues such as unity and democracy, which have both been common and important topics of discussion. The AWL and WP seem to be fighting for the steering wheel, whilst pushing these unaffiliated members to the front, so people can see how student led the operation is. Not to say that graduates shouldn’t be involved in education cuts campaigns, they definitely should, they just should not be chairing every single meeting.

At the July 4th fringe meeting – at the Socialist Worker’s Party (SWP) event ‘Marxism’ – some of NCAFC’s plans for the year ahead were discussed.  The group’s new women’s caucus was raised and an overseas student raised the issue of overseas students paying more fees and how their issues were not being addressed by the British student movement. The prospect of an anti-academies alliance and of linking up with trade unions on campus were also discussed, however these issues mainly seemed to be brought up by the few hardened SWP comrades in attendance, possibly as a distracter topic from other unpalatable issues.

The subject of the UCU’s planned co-ordinated strike action around the October NUS conference came up, along with the question of how NCAFC should build around it and organise an event to coincide with it. This led to the touchy subject of Education Activist Network (which the SWP comrades were representing), the ‘counter campaign’ to NCAFC and how ludicrous it is that the two exist side by side. This view was not held unanimously, some people in the meeting thought the two served different purposes or that the two could never unite so there was no point in discussing it. In general it seemed to be the WP and AWL members who were calling for the group to have some amount of unity with EAN. The SWP youth were very much against any sort of unity between NCAFC and EAN on any level, because this unity would obviously just dissolve immediately ‘due to arguments’.

Some members of NCAFC were asking the SWP to agree to a joint conference between NCAFC and EAN around the time of November, this seems like complete common sense as all they are doing by holding individual conferences at the same time is splitting the crowd and nothing more. Those students that chose EAN over NCAFC would get slightly more diluted politics with a slightly bigger audience and vice versa. With a joint conference the EAN would no doubt try to take control, but if it could be held in a vaguely democratic way this would be a step forward. This seemed to be what NCAFC members were calling for: open discussion between activist groups and democratic unity in action, rather than one group dissolving itself into the other, i.e. NCAFC dissolving itself into EAN. However some of the NCAFC members echoed the SWP in saying it would be too difficult because of hostility and instead they should try to organise joint actions together like demonstrations and pickets – maximum effort, building and working together over an issue already agreed that both agree on, without any of the political discussion or debate.

If NCAFC does not move forward to unity then it will move backwards and dissolve or split, with WP and AWL possibly recruiting a few of the independent members. The ruptures are already showing between the two organisations, particularly over the Israel – Palestine issue. WP suggested NCAFC debate this issue when the national demonstration against the Israeli attack on the Mavi Mamara flotilla clashed with the NCAFC’s June 5th meeting, as there were activists that would have wanted to attend both of these events. The AWL might usually have been the ones to call for a political debate, with their focus on unity, but they argued against even a discussion of the issue, as did some of the independents who argued that NCAFC was not the space for it, etc.  This attitude is holding back the group and their politics, when the issue was discussed obviously both groups clashed heavily – if these differences are not outed, then they are clumsily pasted over and the organisation de-politicised in the process, refusing to adopt positions outside the bread and butter ‘cuts and fees’. The SWP seems to be playing on this issue, whilst also using it, and the alleged fact that the group is organised by ‘islamaphobes’ (the AWL), as a reason against unity with the group. As ever with the activist left, the unwillingness of sectarian groups to debate their differences and struggle for unity results in political stagnancy and malaise.

The Education Activist Network are holding their conference on Saturday, October 31st, 11.00 am – 5.00 pm, Kings College, London.

The National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts are holding their conference on Saturday, November 6th, 11.00 am – 6.00 pm, London (location TBC).