Socialist Students

Alan Milburn, the Blairite former health minister, has blamed too many young people going to university for the fact that almost 100,000 recent graduates are currently not in work or further study.

As part of his ongoing review into ‘NEETs’ (16 to 24-year-olds not in employment, education or training), Milburn will instead push the government to reallocate funding to technical and vocational courses, which he says would better suit the needs of employers.

Clearly there is an urgent need for more funding in further education. Some college leadership teams are warning they could turn away thousands of prospective students this September, owing to insufficient government funding. Staff in the University and College Union (UCU) have taken UK-wide strike action this year in response to more than a decade of cuts, demanding real pay rises that are fully funded by the government.

However, what Milburn is proposing is a moving-around of the existing inadequate funding across post-16 education – in his words, “a better balance” in terms of “allocating resources”; taking from “overemphasised” higher education and giving to further education.

But why should more funding for further education come at the expense of higher education, which is already in a historic funding crisis? A fraction of the money currently sat in the bank accounts of the billionaires would be enough to fully fund both sectors. In contrast, Milburn’s plans would be a green light for university vice-chancellors to go even further in their brutal cuts to jobs and courses, and would increase the risk of university insolvencies.

And how would a ‘reallocation’ of resources be achieved in practice? More than half of higher education funding comes from students’ tuition fees, with UK undergraduate fees set at more than £10,000 per year. In comparison, students at FE colleges below the age of 19 do not pay a penny, with over-19s still only paying a fraction of what university students pay each year for a degree.

There is a danger therefore that Milburn’s recommendations to increase funding for vocational courses will envisage an even more marketised FE sector, in which student fees and private funding from big business both play a more influential role.

The reason that so many young people do not get a job after completing uni is because the capitalist bosses are increasingly not investing their profits back into hiring or training workers. Getting more school-leavers to take ‘technical’ courses is one way for the capitalists to make the government and individual students bear this cost of training. But it will not fundamentally change the lack of decent and stable jobs on offer to young people, across all educational backgrounds, which is a product of the capitalists refusing to invest in jobs during a time of crisis for their system. What young people need is a real choice after leaving school. That means a fully funded and high-quality apprenticeship, training scheme, vocational course, or degree programme for whoever wants it – all with a decent job guaranteed at the end. That means fighting to take the vast wealth and resources, as well as the levers of power, in society out of the hands of the capitalist class, so that the needs of the working class could be actually reflected in a plan for how education and the wider

Morgan Tritton, Hertfordshire Socialist Students

The University of Hertfordshire has informed staff that it will be cutting humanities undergraduate courses – English Language and Linguistics, English Literature, Creative Writing, History, and Philosophy. A petition against the cuts already has over 3,000 signatures.

The uni has not responded to requests from staff regarding the security of their jobs, or how this will impact current students. Prospective students have not been told whether their offers to study the cut courses next term still stand. The University and College Union (UCU) says that staff were denied having input into the decision-making process, and were not given timelines for the cuts.

What’s the truth?

The university says that humanities courses are “no longer financially viable”. The uni vice-chancellor then wrote to staff, assuring that the university is financially stable, and the actions are “not being taken in response to an immediate financial crisis”.

Staff and students say that, by the university’s own admission, these cuts are not being driven by financial necessity, but by management falling in line with the wider marketisation of UK higher education.

In cutting humanities, the university will also create a ‘cold spot’ for these courses in Hertfordshire, meaning higher education will become less accessible to local, working-class, prospective students. Staff have called out the university’s hypocrisy in being a ‘widening access’ institution.

What do we actually need?

Staff and students at the University of Hertfordshire work and study on what feels like a perpetual building site. Management are narrowly focused on so-called profitable courses, and the perception of a successful university to attract international students, rather than actually delivering what students and staff need and demand.

Many Herts students recognise that the UK university funding model is broken, when we see that management treats education as a business first, prioritising reputation over student experience on campus, and the conditions and job security of staff.

Herts Socialist Students stands in solidarity with staff and the UCU in fighting these cuts. And students will be meeting with the vice-chancellor to demand answers. 

Fin Cozens-Stott, Manchester and Salford Socialist Students

Socialist Students members from Manchester and Salford attended the Green May Day rally, organised by the Green Party Trade Union Group.

We spoke to people outside, and it was agreed we could have a Socialist Students stall inside too. This allowed us to talk directly to Green Party members, including local election candidates.

We’re pushing to encourage the Green Party, its internal groups, elected officials, and members to change course and reject the austerity mandated by this Labour government, by voting against cuts. When the Greens have been in power in local government, they have so far complied with Tory and Labour austerity.

Fighting austerity

Green-controlled Bristol Council put through £50 million cuts, while adding £60 million to council reserves. Manchester Greens supported the Labour council’s £6.7 million cuts, continuing the £400 million decline in funding since 2010, worsening council house waiting lists, which stand at 600% of the national average.

When we approached Green leader Zack Polanski at The World Transformed conference, he said that Green councillors had “nothing to do about it”. This is a mistake.

We had many people sign the ‘Trade Unionists for a New Party’ petition, calling on Zack Polanski to ensure Green councillors oppose Labour-enforced austerity by refusing to implement cuts. On the day, this included Aatif ‘Ate’ Zafar, newly elected Manchester councillor for Whalley Range, and Joe Gosling, Usdaw (Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers) activist, and candidate for Stanley & Outwood East ward in Wakefield.

Scrap the debt, we need funding not fees

Becca Bayman, Liverpool Socialist Students

Keir Starmer’s government has announced that interest rates on student loans will be capped at 6% from September 2026. This decision is intended to calm growing outrage among students and graduates facing the rising cost of higher education. This small concession falls far short of addressing the actual problems with the system of higher education funding.

The cap will apply to ‘plan 2’ loans, taken out by 5.8 million students in England and Wales between 2012 and 2023. These graduates have massive debts, blown up by high interest rates meaning unless you are a high earner, the total amount owed increases even as it is being repaid.

While the interest cap is welcome, it is not a relief for students or graduates. The Institute for Fiscal Studies has said the concession will reduce interest for higher-earning students but will do nothing for lower-earning students who will spend a lifetime stuck with a stealth tax paying off their debts. During a burgeoning youth unemployment crisis, where many young people are struggling with precarious employment and low wages, the student finance system continues to place a disproportionate burden on the poorest graduates. As the government has frozen repayment thresholds, by the end of this parliament, people working fulltime on the minimum wage will have to pay.

Government ministers have defended the cap as a way to protect borrowers from potential increases in inflation ‘due to the situation in the Middle East’. However, as household bills increase due to Trump’s war, this interest cap will not stop the working class from having to pay. Starmer’s government made it clear it was not on the side of students and young people when tuition fees were increased last year. As things stand, undergraduate fees will be over £10,000 per year by 2029, and with it, even more debt.

The National Union of Students declared the cap a “huge win”. It definitely proves the government is under pressure. A mass mobilisation of students and young people fighting for free education could win more. This cap is not enough to lessen the decades of debt that will be carried by millions of us. Socialist Students’ Funding Not Fees campaign calls for the scrapping of all tuition fees and the cancellation of student debt. Funding for our education system should come from taking the wealth off the super-rich, not students and workers.

Tilde Resare, Sheffield Socialist Students

Socialist Students Sheffield organised a demonstration against Trump and Netanyahu’s bombings and imperialist escalation in the Middle East. This is the first demo we’ve organised. From this, we got the contact details of several people interested in Socialist Students.

Our campaign started following our International Women’s Day discussion, which focused on the ‘Women, Life, Freedom’ movement in Iran, following the brutal murder of Mahsa Amini by the regime’s ‘morality police’ in 2022.

We promoted our event on social media, had a dedicated leafleting session, as well as attending another student-led demo on campus. We held the protest at the lunchtime rush outside our student union building.

This protest reached different students compared to our previous campaigning. We’re organising more events and campaigns to grow our presence on campus.

York Socialist Students members

Students at York St John’s University protested against sexual harassment, after a number of recent incidents in the student union bar.

As indicated by a number of students who spoke, these incidents are but the tip of the iceberg. To loud chants of “shame”, students spoke of even worse incidents of sexual harassment and rape on campus, where they have felt let down by the university and its provision of student support.

As several speakers said: “We’re paying almost £10,000 a year to be subjected to this”.

Socialist Students member and York St John student Anna spoke to the protest, raising a number of measures that could improve campus safety, including improved lighting, increasing funding to student support, and more.

And key to implementing that would be ending the marketisation of universities. That means they are starved of funding, as well as ensuring that such measures are under the democratic control of elected representatives of students and campus trade unions.

Socialists say scrap fees, cancel all student debt, take the wealth off the super-rich

Adam Harmsworth, Coventry Socialist organizer

The student debt crisis is back in the news after MPs launched an inquiry into Labour’s decision to freeze the repayment threshold for over 5 million graduates on Plan 2 loans.

Plan 2 loans were created by the Tory-Lib Dem coalition government in 2012. Under the Plan 2 terms, graduates earning over a certain salary threshold pay back 9% of their income above that amount, chasing a debt that increases by at least RPI inflation. In November, chancellor Reeves fixed the threshold at £29,385 until 2030.

Labour is trying to shove more graduates stuck on low incomes into making repayments on loans that are impossible to pay off.

The ‘concern’ from sections of the establishment couldn’t be less genuine. Sir Nick Clegg, who co-led the Con-Dem government that trebled tuition fees after he pledged to oppose them, has called the system a “mess”. His solution is just to reverse some decisions made after he lost the election in 2015, but keep graduates stuck in horrendous debt.

In the Financial Times, Cambridge University’s new chancellor Lord Chris Smith (Tony Blair’s first culture secretary in 1997) criticised the high interest rates and the low repayment thresholds. But rather than consider if the tuition fees his government introduced were an abysmal idea, he instead argues that too many young people are going to university! So much for Blair’s “education, education, education”.

The National Union of Students (NUS) meanwhile has launched a petition merely calling for “fairer terms” on student debt. So far 12,676 students have signed. The NUS should be mobilising tens of thousands of students to fight for free, fully funded education.

University education is in crisis. Fees have risen while maintenance grants have been scrapped, yet universities are making cuts and still not balancing the books. 68% of students now work while studying, and food banks are popping up in uni buildings to support impoverished students.

The government can find money for war and backing US imperialism in a heartbeat, but is relying more on students, graduates, and university workers to keep higher education afloat.

Socialist Students are championing the fight for free education, and taking money off the super-rich to fund our universities – for funding not fees. Join the socialists fighting for a decent future for higher education!