National Conference – 31st October 2010

Under the new Con-Dem government, our education is under attack like never before. Education minister David Willetts wants fast-track degrees on the cheap and threatens to remove both the cap on university fees and the EMA for college students. University and college managers are slashing jobs, facilities and whole departments.

From the industrial action at King’s College and Tower Hamlets College to the student occupations at Middlesex University, we have been able to stop some of the most determined attacks. But the worst is still to come, and we urgently need to build and unite our resistance – and to lay out a different vision for education!

Speakers so far confirmed include:
– John McDonnell, Labour MP for Hayes and Harlington
– Alex Callinicos, KCL lecturer & author of “Universities in a Neoliberal World”
– student campaigners & trade union activists from King’s. Sussex, Middlesex and others
– many others TBC

After the success of our London-wide activist meetings and especially of the teach-in at King’s College in February, with around 400 delegates from union branches and student anti-cuts campaigns across the country, and against the backdrop of the ConDem budget, the Browne review and a growing number of disputes in both HE and FE, we are encouraging all students and education workers to save the date.

We encourage campaign groups, Students’ Unions and Trade Union branches to formally back the conference, using the attached model motion, and anyone on facebook can also RSVP to this event page.  (NB please disregard previous messages indicating a date of the 31st December, this was only ever a typo).