Demonstration Against Higher Education Fees!

Higher Education

DEMONSTRATION AGAINST HIGHER EDUCATION FEES!

 

Government puts education into the hands of big business

No university fees! Demonstrate 28 November!

We won’t pay for the bosses’ crisis!

New Labour and the Conservatives are determined to make young people and workers pay for this crisis. On the one hand, they say there are jobs available for all, all you need is ‘determination’. At the same time, they slash funding for youth training and put corrupt fat cats in charge of setting university fees.

Lord Mandelson refused the National Union of Students a voice in the review of university fees because that would harm the ‘objectivity’ of the review. Instead, we have an ‘objective’ board of some of the biggest capitalists and privateers in Britain, chaired by Lord Browne. Lord Browne was Chief Executive of BP until 2007, making billions of pounds out of war in Iraq and environmental destruction. Browne left BP, amidst allegations of corruption, with a £5 million payoff and a £21 million pension pot. Is this man seriously going to say that society cannot afford our education?

David Eastwood, Vice Chancellor of the University of Birmingham, also sits on the review. As part of the Russell Group, he has been demanding students pay more for education for years. The university is currently trying to close its entire sociology department, without consultation with staff, because it is not bringing in enough money. Aston University’s vice chancellor is also ‘objectively’ reviewing university funding, fresh from slashing 18 jobs over the summer.

The rest of the board is made up of a former advisor to Tony Blair (the Prime Minister who abolished free university education), two NGO bigwigs and, unbelievably, Peter Sands, CEO of Standard Chartered Bank. Is he going to demand the same level of investment in education, in our future, that him and his peers have received over the last eighteen months? Of course not. The bosses organisation, the CBI, call for fees of £7,000 a year. Labour and the Tories say similar. Before the review board has met, the outcome is clear. Peter Sands, Lord Browne, Lord Mandelson and all the others want to make us pay for the crisis of their system.

£350 million cuts are being made in vocational education. Out of around 600,000 school leavers, 8,000 will get real apprenticeships, ones which lead to a job and a qualification.

Never mind that young people want to learn, want to work! Never mind that 55% think university education should be free! Since when did the politicians care what we think? Since when did big business and university bosses do favours for us?

Since we organised and fought them. Youth Fight for Jobs says no to university fees, no to writing off our generation, no to mass youth unemployment. We are demonstrating on 28 November – for real jobs, for free education. Join us in the fightback!

Join the demonstration in central London, Malet Street, WC1E, nearest tube Euston / Russell Square. For details of transport from outside London, see: http://www.youthfightforjobs.com/transport

Youth Fight for Jobs: http://www.youthfightforjobs.com

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk