Students at Kent University ended a 17-day long occupation of the main teaching block on Than day, 15 June. The occupation (reported in The Red Mole, 43) largely achieved its aim of reviving the struggle against the 189 redundancies and 10 per cent price increases proposed by the University authorities. The students who occupied understood that by itself the ut-in could not stop the proposed redundancies, that only resolute action by the university worken could do this. The mass rally of workers nd Nudents that ended the occupation ple-derd to continue the struggle which has Netady been extended into Canterbury through the setting up of an action committee, and nationally through a demonstration, organised by the Liaison Committee for the Defence of Student Unions (LCDSU), which attracted around 700 people including delepations from 25 other colleges. The major stumbling block now to direct action by the workers is the general backwardness and weakness of the trade union movement in East Kent which is reinforced by the bureaucratic nature of the unions involved, especially N.U.P.E. WHO CONTROLS? THE NEED TO STRUGGLE AGAINST THE STATE The crisis at Kent University arises directly from the University Grants Commission's policy of demanding that catering be self- financing. Instead of loans to meet deficits as in the past, massive sackings and price increases are on the way for workers and students in colleges throughout the country. Surrey, Warwick, Norwich and Essex all face a similar situation, and students throughout the country will be faced with large increases in residence fees next term. The situation at Kent is therefore a clear example of the general crisis of social expenditure in higher education. As such, the UG's policy on catering is an integral part of the State's need to rapidly expand numbers in higher education, to produce a more highly trained work force geared more closely to the needs of industry, while having to drastically reduce units costs. So to the extent that it is possible (i.e. to the extent that workers and students in the colleges allow it) the State will throw the burden of this expansion onto the workers and students themselves, whether it is by creating redundancies and increasing prices, or by introducing student loans or two year courses. Cl.
Workers or students can only defend their interests against this attack by developing the theme of a veto over the decisions of the university authorities and the plans of the State in higher education, whether it be a workers' veto over redundancies (Kent), or a student veto over price increases (Kent), victimisation (Lancaster), course structure (Portsmouth Poly), or any State interference in students unions (N.London Poly, L.S.E.). It must be made clear that neither workers nor students should take any responsibility whatsoever for the running of colleges under capitalism. It is only in this way, in a struggle against the State, that an effective opposition can be built to the plans of the bourgeoisie in higher education. This is the most vital lesson of the struggle at Kent.
STUDENT UNION AUTONOMY It is precisely to prevent an effective opposition to this offensive in the colleges that the State has moved against what little political autonomy students unions have. Hence, the struggle at Kent raises far wider issues than redundancies and price increases. It is one battle in the war over the political autonomy of students unions and the capitalist technocratic reorientation of higher education. This autonomy does not exist in the abstract, but only when it is exercised. Concretely, this means aligning students unions with the working class in the class struggle, the only alternative being the integration (or rather reintegration) of students unions into the State apparatus. LESSONS OF THE STRUGGLE The worker-student unity in struggle is an important development in the campaign at Kent. The university authorities were so scared of this embryonic unity that a day after the occupation began all the catering staff, the most militant section of the workers, were locked out on full pay. The workers responded to this crude divide and rule tactic by voting full support to the occupation at a joint NUPE/GWU branch meeting, and by. coming to cook for the occupation. The move also failed to turn third year finalists against the struggle against redundancies. Throughout the eight week long struggle workers, students and a few academics have hammered out tactics and strategy together.
What Kent has also shown is the need immediately to generalise local struggles and turn them into national issues if these struggles are to have a chance of success and their lessons to be learnt. Through the work of the LCDSU students went some way to achieving this at Kent. What is necessary now is for the LCDSU to develop the theoretical and practical meaning of rank and file worker student unity as opposed to the absurd posturings of the CP dominated NUS Executive with Vic Feather and his fellow union bureaucrats.
Canterbury IMG