14 years of Tory rule, and what have students got for it?

And it’s not just students who have suffered.

Millions of workers are worse off now than when the Tories were elected in 2010, as wages have fallen thousands of pounds behind inflation. Public services, a lifeline for the majority of people, have been cut to the bone. NHS waiting times have never been so bad, public transport doesn’t work half the time, and entire councils are now declaring themselves ‘bankrupt’.

So it’s no wonder the Tories are so hated. Plagued by infighting and scandals, they are headed for disaster in the next general election, which has to be called this year. According to one poll, just 1% of 18 to 24-year-olds plan to vote Tory in the next general election!

So what do students do in the elections?

Keir Starmer has made clear that his Labour Party will rule in the same capitalist interests as the Tories. He has helped transform the Labour Party back into a ‘safe pair of hands’ for big business, putting capitalist profit-making firmly before the lives of working-class and young people.

That’s why Starmer has abandoned the pledge of former leader, Jeremy Corbyn, to scrap tuition fees and restore maintenance grants for students. For the same reason, he has refused to back workers taking strike action for better pay and conditions, including staff in schools, colleges and universities.

While many students will ‘hold their nose’ and vote Labour just to get the Tories out, others will find the stench of Starmer’s rotten policies too much to bear. That’s especially true for the thousands of students who have protested against Starmer’s support for the slaughter of Palestinians in Gaza.

Some may see the Green Party as an alternative. But their record in local government – where Green-led councils have carried out devastating cuts to jobs and services – shows that, when push comes to shove, the Green Party will fall in line and carry out the bidding of the capitalist class.

We need representatives in parliament and the council chambers who point to the massive wealth hoarded at the top of society, and actually fight for it to be in our hands.

Vote Socialist!
Vote Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition!

Solving all the crises facing students and young people – crumbling education, a housing crisis, the sky-high cost of living, climate breakdown, war, discrimination and oppression – means replacing the anarchic, profit-driven system of capitalism with socialism.

We think that includes using the platform of elections to help spread socialist ideas. Workers and socialists standing in elections shows that we don’t have to leave ‘politics’ – ultimately, the struggle for control over society – to different shades of pro-capitalist politicians.

At a time when none of the main parties stand up for us, even a handful of socialist candidates getting elected could be an important step towards a new, mass party with socialist policies, which stands up for workers, students and everyone else currently suffering under capitalism.

That’s why Socialist Students has joined the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC). TUSC was set up to allow workers, trade unionists, students, community campaigners and anti-austerity activists of various different organisations to stand under a common banner against the pro-capitalist establishment parties in elections.

As part of TUSC, we are fighting for a working-class, socialist alternative to appear on as many ballot papers as possible in the upcoming local elections and general election.

Fight for socialism

In a socialist system, the banks and major companies that currently dominate the economy would be owned and run democratically by workers themselves, as the ones who actually keep society running day to day, not the capitalist bosses. Resources and technology would be taken out of the private hands of a tiny minority, making it possible to democratically plan the economy to meet everyone’s needs. It would be an international system, joining together socialist governments on the basis of cooperation, not competition.

That is the kind of world that Socialist Students is fighting for. Winning it will require a massive international movement, led by the working class and organised behind socialist ideas. That would then lay the basis for a world free of all oppression, division, climate destruction and war. The job of socialists is to help build that movement, in whatever way we can – including at the ballot box.

Join Socialist Students and help us build a political voice that unites the struggles of students and workers in the fight for socialism.

Socialist Students says:

• End the student housing crisis
  Introduce rent controls in all student accommodation. For socialist councillors who take on dodgy private landlords.
  
• End the student cost-of-living crisis
  Replace maintenance loans with maintenance grants which cover all living costs. Scrap tuition fees, cancel all student debt – make the super-rich pay.
  
• Stop war and occupation! End the siege of Gaza
  Workers and young people internationally: unite and fight the capitalist warmongers!
  
• Combat climate change
  Carry out a massive switch to green energy NOW! Take the energy companies under democratic public ownership, to be run by workers and not the bosses.
  
• Fight for socialism
  For the banks, monopolies and major industries to be owned and run by the working class to meet people’s needs, not the profits of the super-rich.