by Stella Christou and Guy Howie (UCLU Marxist Society treasurer)

Central to my role as Education and Campaigns Officer would be campaigning
against all fees and debt imposed on students. The costs of fees and student living
shackle us with debt at a time when graduates are finding high-level employment
harder and harder to come by. The cost of university has also put many prospective
students off higher education, at an even greater cost to society.

As has been revealed in the plans to build a new campus in Stratford and to redevelop
extensively in other areas, the money is available for UCL to do away with tuition
fees and to provide a living grant for students. This money, however, is in the hands
of private investors, who will only fund ventures through which they can make a
return for themselves.

Disparity

The hike in tuition fees has already been damaging to the level of financial equality
reflected in university admissions. Where students cannot afford to study, others who
can will take their place.

This disparity will inevitably continue after university into the job market. This is
especially the case in London where graduate jobs are more widely available and
better paid than average, and yet it is difficult for those on lower wages to cope in
such an expensive city. Many low-end jobs are still below living wage.

That such an inequality could result from tuition fees and living debt is untenable, and
must be fought against.

The Only Option

To oppose all tuition fees and living debt is the only real choice open to students.

If tuition fees are accepted as they are, then it must also be accepted that they will
increase further. The global economic crisis is cutting deeper and deeper into Britain’s
public institutions. On the basis of capitalism, there is a growing need to cut the
national deficit and the increasingly involved private businesses seek a larger slice of
university takings. Furthermore, as rent prices and living costs rise, so too does the
burden of debt facing students when leaving university.

Campaigning for a concessional reduction in fees from the government, often
proposed as a more ‘realistic’ struggle, isn’t a viable option either. To suggest this
campaign line is to forget the increase in fees in the first place, and the fundamental
reasons behind it. Fees and student debt will increase as long as our economy is based
on crisis ridden capitalism, which offers only decades of austerity. Students should
not suffer according to the decline of an unstable economy they have played no part
in harming, and yet the rich are intent on making the poor and the youth pay for their
crisis.

We must not stray from campaigning against all fees and student debt.

Mass Campaign

The issue of student fees and living debt applies to the overwhelming majority of the
student body. Almost all of us will begin our lives as graduates already owing tens of
thousands of pounds in an economy digging itself deeper into the same hole. This is
not something any student should simply accept.

Our union must be accountable to us. In a campaign against fees, I will make sure
that the student body as a whole understands what it is fighting for and stands united,
so that the campaign is not simply limited to an already radicalised but small layer
of students. Our university cannot continue to diminish the needs of students and put
our education second to profiteering, something which is detrimental to everyone on
campus.

The campaign of UCLU against fees and living debt must also be linked to a wider
campaign against fees. The platform for this must be the body which represents
students nationally, the body which any mass organisation of students would most
naturally incline towards – the NUS. By making our voices heard in the NUS, I will
take an anti-fees campaign further into the larger problems in society as a whole. We
must also link UCLU and the anti-fees movement to the local and national trade union
movements.

We need a national movement of workers and students against the destruction of
public institutions, for free education and student living to benefit the whole of
society. Ultimately, we need to fight for a different kind of economic system – a
socialist one based on nationalised and democratically planned production – for only
that can plan the economy in accordance with need, not profit.

Vote Stella #1 for Education and Campaigns Officer!

During this year’s election campaign students may have noticed that there are two clear left-wing candidates running for the Education and Campaigns Officer position. Inevitably this has raised some questions amongst the students. What do we have in common? Where do we differ? What implications does this have for a left candidate getting elected?

Programme

To say that myself and Keir Gallagher are both running on a left-wing programme does not say very much and remains very abstract. What we should ask is what do we concretely stand for?

I stand on a clear programme stating the need for socialist policies to fight the Tory education cuts. The question cannot be solved within the confines of the UCL campus. The cuts in education and the rise of fees are not problems of UCL, but consequences of the capitalist crisis.  I think it is important to be clear on this question as any reforms cannot be achieved or defended without coming into conflict with the limitations of capitalism.

Therefore, it is important to make no artificial distinction between the politics of UCL and the politics of the national student movement. That is why I also emphasise the need to have a healthy attitude towards the NUS. I am opposed to any attempts to split the NUS or create a new student union on a national level. The key to creating a fighting student movement will not be found in splitting our forces, but linking them up and rejuvenating them through an alliance with the labour and trade union movement.

It is only through such an alliance that students can effectively campaign for the abolition of all fees and student debt. Our campaign should not stop short at opposing an increase in fees, but should go all the way to abolishing all fees and introducing a living grant for students. The wealth exists in society for all education to be free, it’s just in private hands.

I fully endorse Keir’s position against the UCL Masterplan. He is correct in pointing out the undemocratic nature through which this project arose. As he correctly says, it "...does not represent the needs of the entire UCL community" 

What it does represent are the interests of big business outside of UCL and their lackeys in the UCL management. This, once again, shows that one can only address the problems of UCL by tracing their roots in the current system.

The problems of “late and unhelpful feedback, overcrowded seminars [and] inadequate postgrad stipends” are extremely important issues. This is why I have raised two key demands that go to the root of these problems. 

Firstly, we must defend lecturers. The cuts don't only affect services and facilities, they also threaten our lecturers. As I say in my manifesto, fewer staff means larger classes, thus lowering standards.

Second, student rents - particularly in London - are too damn high! And this has a direct effect on education, increasing the stress of students. This also forces them to take up precarious jobs that reduce their study time, and generally damages their student experience.  

The fact that postgrad students are having to take on employment during their studies to supplement their stipends is a question of rent costs, and living costs in general. That is why I have identified in my programme the need to reintroduce a living grant for all students in higher education.

Splitting the left?

It might be argued that two left-wing candidates should not run against each other, as this would split the progressive vote in UCLU. However, with the preferential voting system students can vote for more than one candidate, meaning that the left-wing vote will not be split.

On the contrary, two left-wing candidates can reinforce each other, adding diversity, stimulating debate and making the campaign more dynamic. All the above will increase participation in the elections for student representatives.

I don't believe that students are hard to mobilise or disinterested in politics. The accusation that has been levelled at young people for years, that they are apathetic, is a slander against the youth.

If you talk to people today abut concrete issues such as tuition fees, cuts to housing benefits and hospital A&E wards or the general policies of the coalition government and its austerity programme, people have opinions. But that does not mean that they take an interest in Westminster politics, which many feel unrepresented by. The same is the case for UCLU students. If they feel let down by the politics of the union, this does not mean they are apolitical.

Therefore I think that if either Keir or me were to step down in this election, this would be a loss to student democracy. Keeping the Tories out will not be achieved in this way. There are no shortcuts to a victory for the left. The way forward is a bold, positive campaign for socialist policies!

     
Vote Stella Christou #1!

Vote Keir Gallagher #2!

For Education and Campaigns Officer