Tag: universities

Fight Labour’s fee hikes!

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Fund our education – take the wealth off the 1%

Build ‘Your Party’ to fight for free education and socialism

Starmer’s Labour government has confirmed its plans for university tuition fees to go up every year. Left up to Labour, our fees will rise to well over £10,000 by 2029. That’s after fees have already gone up this term – the first rise in almost a decade.

And what do students get? Not only are we set to graduate with even more student debt, our maintenance loans don’t even cover the cost of housing, let alone other essentials. Even those receiving the maximum maintenance loan this year would need to take 20 hours of paid work per week just to reach a basic standard of living.

Meanwhile, cuts to our education keep coming. Over half of universities are set to record ‘deficit budgets’ this year, the government’s own Office for Students has predicted. The University and College Union (UCU) estimates that uni bosses have announced 15,000 job cuts in the last year, destroying thousands of courses and even entire departments in dozens of universities.

Some vice chancellors are even looking at ‘mergers’ with other universities. But why should they get to decide this over the heads of thousands of students and staff? Their record is one of running our universities into the ground, in collaboration with successive Tory and Labour governments. We can’t trust any of them with our education, because they all accept a capitalist system that puts the profits of the super-rich before the needs of the vast majority – including the right to a decent education.

Workers have fought back – students can organise too!

By taking strike action last year, university workers were able to halt planned cuts in several universities. In Scotland and Wales, staff also won millions of pounds in extra government funding through their strikes.

Imagine how much more funding could be forced from the government if there was strike action on all campuses across the country! That’s why Socialist Students supports university workers taking strike action, including supporting a vote to strike in the current UK-wide strike ballots by four campus unions (UCU, Unison, Unite, EIS).

Socialist Students members will be on the picket line supporting staff in our shared struggle for funding, not fees and cuts. We campaign for student unions to be democratic, fighting organisations that give us a voice – including committing to building student solidarity whenever staff take strike action for better pay, conditions and funding.

On a national level, we have also been putting pressure on the National Union of Students (NUS) to give a clear lead to students against the current university crisis. Unfortunately, the NUS did not take up our proposal for a national ‘free education’ demonstration this autumn. Imagine what a different position students would be in now if the NUS had gone on the front foot against Labour’s attacks on education.

As a step towards the national representation students really deserve, even a handful of SUs linking up nationwide to coordinate campaigns for proper funding – not more fees and cuts – could have a big impact.

We won’t accept their crisis

The university sector is in a deep funding crisis. But the only ‘solution’ offered by this pro-big business Labour government is to raise fees and encourage even more cuts, pushing the burden even further onto staff and students.

Why should we pay the price, at a time when the rich have never been richer? The FTSE 100 biggest corporations in Britain have been paying out around £85 billion annually to their shareholders. Students and staff need to unite in a movement that could put that wealth in our hands in order to fully fund education. That would include making education free for all, by abolishing tuition fees and providing maintenance grants that actually cover students’ living costs.

If education was fully funded, university managements would not be incentivised to invest our tuition fees in arms manufacturers and other shady companies in order to boost income. They would have no justifications for making cuts. Student housing could be massively expanded and improved, with rent controls introduced to ensure no student is paying the majority of their income on a place to live.

Your Party must seriously fight for free education

Socialist Students initiated the Funding Not Fees campaign last year, as a means to get students organised alongside staff in a movement for fully funded, free education. As well as holding protests on dozens of campuses, a key part of the campaign has been lobbying MPs – fighting for our movement to have a political voice.

That fight could be massively boosted this year. Two MPs, Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana, have said they will build a new party. Over 800,000 signed up to find out more about ‘Your Party’ within a week of its announcement.

When Corbyn was leader of the Labour Party, his anti-austerity, anti-war policies enthused hundreds of thousands of young people. A major reason for that was his offer of free education in the 2017 and 2019 general elections.

Now students have the chance for there to be a mass party that will fight fees and cuts, and fund education by making the super-rich pay.

Just the prospect of a new party fighting ‘for the many, not the few’ has Labour under pressure. At the same time as raising fees, the government has been forced to announce the reintroduction of maintenance grants for tens of thousands of students. While this is far from adequate, it is nonetheless a concession to the anger of millions of working-class and young people, who are desperately looking for a political alternative to Starmer’s war and austerity agenda.

Socialist Students members are joining Your Party and will do all we can for it to fight for free education, and a real socialist alternative to the misery that capitalism means for working-class and young people.

For a mass weekend demonstration against Labour austerity

Socialist Students is supporting trade union activists calling on the TUC (the organisation bringing together 5.5 million trade union members) to name the date for a mass weekend demonstration against Labour austerity – ideally Saturday 22 November, just before the Autumn Budget on Wednesday 26 November.

We think Corbyn, Sultana and Your Party members should amplify the call for such a weekend demonstration, which could act as a launchpad for sustained trade union action in defence of workers and young people – including against tuition fee rises and cuts to university jobs.

What better way to announce Your Party as force through which young people could fight for a real future, a week before the founding conference on November 29-30?

Build a movement for:

  • No fee rises! Scrap tuition fees and cancel student debt
  • Bring back maintenance grants for all students, rising with inflation
  • Stop all cuts and closures on campus
  • Rent controls in student accommodation
  • End low pay and precarious employment
  • Divestment from arms and big business – no place for profiteers from war and exploitation on our campus
  • A political voice for students that fights to take the wealth off the 1% and for socialism

UCU demo must be step towards national fightback on cuts

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Adam Powell Davies, Socialist Students national organiser

Around 500 rallied in London on Saturday 10 May for the UCU ‘Protect Education Now’ national demonstration. The protest brought together workers from across the education sector to demand an end to cuts in universities, colleges and prison education.

Socialist Students brought solidarity, with members travelling from across the UK to attend. Our placard slogans and chants included ‘funding not fees, no staff redundancies’, and ‘money for jobs and education, not for war and occupation’.

Post-16 education faces its deepest funding crisis in decades. Currently one in two universities are cutting jobs and courses.

This Labour government, acting in defence of the capitalists’ profit interests, is determined to squeeze funding for education and all our public services. Only a mass campaign bringing together workers across sectors will be able to win the public funding that is needed to save post-16 education from the current crisis of marketisation.

That’s why this demonstration was significant – it was a glimpse of what can be done when a national lead is given. It was positive that UCU general secretary Jo Grady told the rally that the 10 May demo will not be the last national action in the campaign to stop the cuts.

Socialist Students supports calls by activists in UCU for 10 May to be a step towards building a concerted fightback, including properly preparing for UK-wide action, coordinated with other education unions.

The demo heard from UCU activists from Cardiff and Dundee universities, where staff have taken strike action and successfully halted compulsory redundancies this year. This shows the potential for UK-wide strike action to halt cuts. Any industrial action should be linked to a political strategy that demands full public funding, paid for by the super-rich.

Several speakers called for more lobbying of MPs. Socialist Students agrees with this approach, as it can help clarify who is on the side of our movement. But that has to be combined with a call for action from those MPs who claim they stand with us – like demanding they raise our campaigns in parliament.

Socialist Students has been organising lobbies of MPs through the Funding Not Fees campaign this year. In the run-up to the 11 June government spending review, we will be contacting MPs to ask that they submit an anti-cuts, free education amendment – to demand the super-rich pays for the crisis in post-16 education, not students and workers.

Socialist Students societies have also been busy organising Funding Not Fees protests and meetings around the country. This week at Bradford Uni we held a successful day of action against the cuts, with support from UCU and Unison branches.

Unfortunately, Socialist Students did not get the opportunity to address the 10 May demo. Two of our members asked to speak, to bring solidarity to UCU and talk about our campaigning. But despite being told there might be time at the end, the rally was cut short by 40 minutes without explanation.

There was one speaker bringing solidarity from students, NUS president Amira Campbell. Members of the Socialist Students steering committee will be meeting with Amira and NUS vice-president (Higher Education) Alex Stanley to discuss how to build a student movement alongside staff to end the crisis in higher education.

Staff and students unite against Bradford uni cuts

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TJ Diniz Mota, Leeds Socialist Students

Socialist Students held a successful day of action on 13 May, building a visible and defiant stand against devastating cuts proposed by university management.

Many shared sadness and disbelief at the university’s decision to axe its media and television course during Bradford’s tenure as the UK City of Culture. Culture means little to profit vultures.

There are proposals to stop their flagship chemistry course, close down the university nursery, and slash 300 jobs – an eye-watering 20% of the workforce.

The protest was backed by the University and College Union (UCU) branch. And staff from across the university came out in support.

Further solidarity was shown online by Unison union at Leeds uni, which promoted the protest in the days prior. Supporters of Bradford and Shipley Trades Union Council also attended.

Anger is growing

This action was the result of weeks of consistent organising. Through weekly campaign stalls, online promotion, and raising the issue at local trade union meetings, we heard the frustration and growing anger from staff and students.

Support wasn’t just garnered from the university community. Cars going by our action blared their horns in support, crowds across the street shouted their sympathies, and passers-by commended our efforts.

All of this just goes to show the growing awareness of austerity and the national crisis in higher education funding. Uni vice-chancellors are earning more than the prime minister, and making decisions at the cost of student’s futures and staff livelihoods.

There was overwhelming support for strike action in Bradford UCU’s indicative ballot. Socialist Students continues to organise, raise awareness, demand no redundancies, no austerity budgets, and free, fully funded education for all. Because a post-16 education is not a commodity.

Socialist Students win free societies & more democracy at Herts uni

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Herts Uni Socialist Students featuring Morgan (middle)

Morgan Tritton, Hertfordshire Socialist Students

We started Herts Socialist Students in November 2024 and were frustrated by the inaction of the students’ union (SU) on our campus. At the University of Hertfordshire the SU has repeatedly defended the university’s actions over the interests of its own members – students ourselves. There is no real separation between the university and the SU which often echoes university management.

We investigated the SU’s governance, transparency, and action plan. We found little evidence of advocacy on urgent issues such as the cost-of-living crisis, tuition fee hikes, accommodation conditions, violence against women, and campus safety. What we did find, however, was stagnation – a culture that prioritises protecting the image of the university over fighting for the needs of the student body.

We raised our concerns at the November 2024 student council meeting. It took four months, and the submission of a formal motion, before any action was taken!

In April 2025, we submitted three motions: to improve SU governance and transparency, to allow free society memberships and open meetings, and to demand action on violence against women on campus. Prior to this, there had only been one motion passed in the last two years. We faced attempts to resist, delay, water down, or dismiss the motions entirely from SU staff. They downplayed safety concerns by citing a lack of official reports and claimed transparency had now been addressed and further student oversight was unnecessary.

We responded in full, challenged their narrative, and two days before the council meeting, the SU backed down. All three motions were debated and passed overwhelmingly. We came in force to a student council meeting to highlight inaction and received a positive response from students.

This fight is far from over. We are in contact with the SU President and Women’s Officer and will be meeting in the coming weeks. Our passed governance motion requires monthly officer updates, motion tracking, and scheduled council meetings, basic measures that should have existed already, and we will make sure these happen.

We are fighting to repoliticise and democratise our SU. We are organising not just for better policies, but for a shift in power on campus from unelected managers and bureaucrats to the hands of students ourselves, alongside representatives of staff unions. We must continue to scrutinise our SUs and question: who benefits from keeping students in the dark? Who benefits from an unorganised student body? University managements and the relationships they have with pro-capitalist politicians and big business.

The failures of Herts SU reflect a nationwide crisis across higher education, faced with a funding crisis universities constantly put their finances above the interests of students and staff.

As part of the Funding Not Fees campaign, we must confront every institution on campuses that facilitate poor student and staff conditions and rising costs for students. Compromised and undemocratic student unions, acting as extensions of university management, must be challenged as part of a broader fight for free, fully funded education, and fighting democratic student organisations must be built.

Cost of studying puts working-class people off university

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Socialist Students campaigning against the student cost-of-living crisis

Studying at university has become even more unaffordable for less well-off students, a recent report published by the Higher Education Policy Institute (HEPI) reveals.

The report calculates that the ‘Minimum Income Standard’ – the minimum income needed to study at university per year, including costs of living such as rent and groceries but excluding tuition fee costs – has risen to £18,632 for those studying outside of London, and £21,774 for those within London. Maintenance loans are able to cover less of these expenses year on year.

According to the National Union of Students, 69% of students are now employed alongside studying to afford their studies, up from 45% in 2022. Students have reported that balancing working, studying, and other commitments – alongside worrying about money – is having a negative impact on their academic achievement.

Access to higher education is further becoming the privilege of the wealthy few, deepening the economic inequality in the UK as working-class and poorer young people are forced to forego education and take low-paid jobs with little chance of long-term progression. Meanwhile, universities are being run like businesses: relying on inflated fees while simultaneously axing degree programmes, underpaying staff, and providing little support to students. Staff participating in the UCU strikes in 2022-23 spoke out on many of these deeply ingrained issues.

The long-term impact of the crisis in higher education is dire. Young people will have fewer opportunities, and industries dependent on qualified graduates will continue to face worker shortages.

The solution is obvious: stop treating education as big business and start treating it as an essential public service, free to use with grants, not debt, to enable people to study. It’s time for a democratically run and high-quality higher education system that is accessible to all and meets the needs of both students and staff.

Socialist Students says:

  • Fight for fully funded free education – scrap and refund tuition fees, cancel student debt, replace student loans with living grants tied to the rate of inflation. Make the super-rich pay!
  • Take universities under the democratic control of elected bodies of campus trade unions, students and communities
  • Build democratic student organisations to link up with the campus trade unions and fight for what our universities need
  • Build a new mass party that will stand up for students and workers
  • Fight for socialist change – for democratic public ownership of the banks, monopolies and major industry to provide us with a future

Socialist ideas to build student Gaza protests

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View this article as a leaflet, to take these ideas down to a protest near you.

A fighting programme to build the student encampments for Gaza

DISCLOSE ALL FINANCES!

Universities should open their books to a democratic inquiry by elected students’ representatives and the campus trade unions, with the power to terminate all contracts and research tied to war and occupation while guaranteeing jobs and funding.

END MARKETISATION!

The UK government must fully fund education to disincentivise universities from gambling our fees on dodgy companies and ‘vanity projects’. Scrap tuition fees, cancel student debt, and reintroduce living grants for all students.

BROADEN THE PROTESTS!

Our protests would be strengthened if more students – and workers – joined the action. Encampments could collectively organise:

  • Stalls and leafleting sessions, where we can talk to other students about our action and encourage them to join
  • A rally with speakers invited from local trade union branches, and students from other universities, colleges and schools nearby
  • A lobby of the local MP or councillors alongside other students, workers and trade unionists, to demand they explain their position on the Israeli state’s onslaught in Gaza
  • A march to a local school or college, encouraging students there to walk out and join us for a protest
  • A mass meeting open to all who want to discuss how we can build this movement against war, terror and oppression

SUs SHOULD BE ON OUR SIDE!

Students’ unions are elected to give students a voice – they should call a special meeting, open to all students and staff, to discuss the above demands and other ideas to build our movement. Students need fighting, democratic organisations that represent our interests against management, the government and big business.

WE NEED A POLITICAL VOICE!

Winning a free, democratic and genuinely ethical education system means fighting to take wealth and power off the capitalist elites. Starmer’s Labour Party won’t even begin to fight for this. We need a new workers’ party with socialist policies to end war, oppression and capitalism.

Socialist Students is part of the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC). You could stand with us as an anti-war, socialist student candidate in the upcoming general election.

Find out more

SOCIALIST STUDENTS SAYS:

  • End the siege of Gaza! For the immediate withdrawal of the Israeli military from the occupied territories
  • For a mass struggle of the Palestinians, under their own democratic control, to fight for liberation
  • For the building of independent workers’ parties in Palestine and Israel, and links between them
  • For an independent, socialist Palestinian state, alongside a socialist Israel, with guaranteed democratic rights for all minorities, as part of the struggle for a socialist Middle East
  • No trust in capitalist politicians, internationally or in Britain. Fight to build a workers’ party in Britain that stands for socialism and internationalism.

Agree? Join the socialists!

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Build the student protests against Gaza slaughter

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University students across the United States have set up encampments to protest against the brutal onslaught on the Palestinian people by the Israeli state. This comes after the US Government agreed an extra $15 billion for the Israeli military. Students are calling on universities to cut ties with companies making huge profits aiding the Israeli military and its occupation in Gaza.

There has been vicious police suppression against the protesters, showing how cruel the university managements are by encouraging these attacks on students and staff. In Columbia University, for example, students were faced with hundreds of riot police who barbarically attacked protesters and arrested students and staff en masse.

It is not only university management; the pro-capitalist Democratic and Republican parties support and encourage these cruel responses by police and university security.

UK protests

Students here have seen the events in the US and have taken action onto their campuses with solidarity protests and encampments. Students fighting against the war do not have a mass party that represents them either.

In order for students to defend the right to protest in solidarity with the Palestinian people, students need to have their own democratic organisations. They could link up with the workers’ movement and the trade unions. Socialist Party members are fighting in trade unions to bring together workers in the arms and logistics industries to discuss and debate what action they can take against the war – workers in the same companies students are protesting against.

Students, linked to the workers’ movement, could help take the necessary steps for genuine workers’ political representation, to fight against the barbaric war on Gaza and the right to protest on campuses and in the workplaces, but also to fight against the housing crisis, never-ending cuts and exploitation here in Britain.

The fight against war means fighting for socialism. It’s the working-class and students internationally who have the power to bring that change about.

Socialist Students says:

  • Stop the Gaza slaughter – for the permanent withdrawal of the Israeli military from the occupied territories
  • Solidarity with students occupying universities across the US and Britain. Stop arming Israeli state terror!
  • Defend the right to protest on campus. Student unions must lead campaigns to defend any students victimised for protesting against war and oppression
  • Kick out the Tories! But Starmer’s Labour is no alternative. Help us build a new workers’ party with socialist policies to end war, austerity and capitalism
  • For a socialist Middle East and world!

Oxford

Appearing overnight, the newly formed ‘Oxford Action for Palestine’ added Oxford to the long list of Palestinian solidarity encampments spanning the world. So, with leaflets, Socialist newspapers, and six boxes of cereal in tow, we headed down to lend our support and put forward a socialist programme.

The group’s appointed media liaison explained the group is comprised of a mix of students and professors standing in solidarity with their Palestinian counterparts. She said that they don’t intend to leave until their demands are met, which are:

  1. Disclose all finances and open the University’s books
  2. Divest from Israeli genocide, apartheid, and occupation
  3. Overhaul university investment policy
  4. Boycott Israeli genocide, apartheid, and occupation
  5. Stop banking with Barclays
  6. Support Palestinian-led rebuilding of education in Gaza

Plenty of positive aspects to their demands, such as opening the University’s books, are mirrored by their collaboration with students at other universities and with university trade unions. The group has been working alongside the University and College Union (UCU) branch which sent out a statement supporting the camp. Further collaboration was seen with the camp swelling to around 500 as part of a healthcare workers’ vigil.

When asked what message the group would like to send to socialists, the response was very direct. She called on socialists to get involved in their local camps, or build new ones if not already established.

I agree, socialists should get involved, but also use all the levers available to workers in addition to occupations. Only with workers and students acting side by side will their full demands be met.

Rachel Cox, Oxford Socialist Party

Manchester

On the 1 May, students at the University of Manchester (UoM), including Manchester Leftist Action, Youth Front for Palestine, Youth Demand, and Manchester Palestine Action, occupied Brunswick Park as an escalation of a series of short occupations resisting Israel’s assault on Palestine and the university’s ties with arms companies.

When I visited the occupation in Manchester for an interview, they had just renamed it Dr Adnan Al-Bursh Park, after a Palestinian doctor and professor who died in an Israeli prison on 19 April.

Among the groups’ demands is no disciplinary action against students involved. Already a student is facing suspension for their journalistic work exposing UoM’s vice chancellor saying she was comfortable with arms industries being on campus.

So far, other than the threat of suspension, the university has put up no resistance to the occupation. A spokesperson for the group said: “If the university wants to put a possession order through, they’re welcome to, and we will decide collectively what we want to do about that.”

I asked what the group want people to do: “Show your support, be loud, keep shouting about Palestine because the second we don’t, we lose the rich legacy of the Palestinian people.”

Socialist Students calls for students to organise democratically, and link up with the broader workers’ movement, to resist war, occupation and university marketisation. Universities having strong ties with the arms industry is a product of the broader issue of treating education as a market rather than a public service. Governmental funding has been slashed, and so management turn to wealthy companies, exploitative student rents and high international fees to fill the deficit. A socialist transformation of society is the only permanent solution, and if you want to help get us there get in touch with Socialist Students or the Socialist Party and build a mass movement of students and workers to resist war and capitalism.

Sam Hey, Manchester Socialist Students

UCL

Students at University College London have gone into occupation demanding an end to the institution’s support for the Israeli state onslaught on Palestine.

The tent encampment follows an earlier room occupation. UCL management has responded by having security close the campus to the public.

A solidarity protest on Friday 3 May attracted around a hundred across both sides of the gates at short notice. Supporters outside were open to discussing socialist ideas to end the war, with one telling me he had voted for the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC) in the London elections the day before.

To defend and extend protest actions like the UCL occupation, students need their own democratic campaign organisations that can draw together the various strands of student struggle and link up with campus trade unions. Join Socialist Students to help us build that!

James Ivens

Warwick

Students and supporters gathered to hear speakers at the Warwick protest from the anti-war and trade union movement. The speaker from the Fire Brigades Union (FBU) mentioned the potential role of workers in stopping arms supplies to an illegal war.

As we tried to hand out TUSC election leaflets, a self-admitted prospective local Labour Party candidate in a mask and hood tried to take our leaflets, claiming this wasn’t a political protest!

Warwick Socialist Students

Leeds

Socialist Party members visited the encampment opposite Leeds University Union. While we visited, university staff members also came down to offer support. We explained that we stood in the elections opposing the war on Gaza as part of TUSC, and our election leaflets were added to those being handed to supporters of the occupation.

Student occupiers joined the Leeds TUC May Day march for peace at the weekend which swelled to over 500 strong.

Uni bosses say: ‘increase fees’ We say: ‘Abolish them!’

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Ted Boyle, Sheffield Socialist Students

Behind closed doors, a major university policy change is being discussed and, typically, its not good news! Vivienne Stern, the CEO of employers’ organisation, Universities UK, insists that students finance the gap in university budgets yet again, through ever-higher tuition fees. This is off the back of a broad financial report, which outlines the very real mess that university managements have found itself in, where issues such as an exodus of international students, whose higher tuition than domestic students many universities rely on, have been compounded by unprecedented inflation.

Yet there are no illusions about the popularity of such a move: “Political suicide”, Stern describes it – very hot in Westminster right now. She urges whoever is in power to implement it that they “act quickly” before an inevitable wave of student outrage. Yes, ‘before anyone notices’ seems to be the strategy they’re going for here!

And no doubt such outrage would be fierce: students are already bearing the brunt of major systemic failings. With the confidence built during the continuing wave of agitation for Palestinian liberation, no doubt we would be on the streets in our thousands, as students did over a decade ago the last time tuition fees were tripled.

But why wait for things to get worse? We students don’t need permission to organise and fight to make university life bearable. Stern says raise tuition fees, we say: ‘Abolish them!’ And secure ample student maintenance grants in turn. Keir Starmer, likely future prime minister, U-turned on Jeremy Corbyn’s free education policy. We need a new mass party that will stand up for students and workers.

Socialist Students says:

  • Fight for fully funded free education – scrap and refund tuition fees, cancel student debt, replace student loans with living grants tied to the rate of inflation. Make the super-rich pay!
  • Take universities under the democratic control of elected bodies of campus trade unions, students and communities
  • Build democratic student organisations to link up with the campus trade unions and fight for what our universities need
  • Build a new mass party that will stand up for students and workers
  • Fight for socialist change – for democratic public ownership of the banks, monopolies and major industry to provide us with a future