Universities

On 24 November members of the Independent Workers Union of Great Britain (IWGB) and supporters occupied the foyers of two buildings at City University in London to demand justice for members who work as night cleaners there. Three workers have been victimised after a wider group registered a collective grievance about issues of mistreatment and overwork with the university’s subcontractor, Julius Rutherfoord Ltd. One worker (Bianca) has been sacked, one (Maria) disciplined and one (Ana Maria) physically attacked, by the son of the manager the grievance was against. Updates and links on twitter...

Report after report has pointed to a rapid rise in rents for students, and poor levels of maintenance. Universities have added to the housing crisis, with a move to private providers rather than in-house accommodation, so direct control over rents is removed. In any case, university-owned accommodation rents have risen more than maintenance support. A report from the Higher Education Policy Institute (HEPI) on ten university cities found rents up 14.6% 2021-22 to 2023-4, and private sector rents up 19%. Meanwhile the maximum student maintenance loan in England rose 5.2%. In 2023-4 in England...

The Socialist Appeal society at University College London (UCL) was suspended on 11 October for its “Intifada until Victory” posters, and on 19 October organised a joint demonstration with UCL Socialist Alternative, both protesting against the university’s crackdown. Socialist Alternative were not prevented from holding their meeting (as it was held off-campus), but the advertisement for it on the university’s website was removed, on grounds (as with Socialist Appeal) of “inciting violence”. Protestors also heard about the suspension pending investigation by SOAS university, nearby, of four...

On Wednesday 11 October, the Marxist Student Society (the student organisation for Socialist Appeal) was suspended by the administration at University College London, pending investigation. The suspension came after the society refused to take down posters for an event that evening on Gaza. The posters used the IMT’s new slogan, “Intifada Until Victory”, which the university administration claimed could be seen as “inciting violence”. At SOAS University in London, worse: individual students suspended after a demonstration on 9 October (Palestine Society, not IMT). Whatever we think of the IMT...

After a summer of confusion over strategy and unacceptable delays to a national re-ballot of members in the long-running University and College Union (UCU) dispute over pay and conditions, 42 branches struck in the week from 25 September. The week was originally planned to be a national strike. An emergency meeting of the union’s Higher Education Committee decided to allow branches to opt out. That left 42 to fight on, many in pursuit of local fights against punitive deductions of pay for the Marking and Assessment Boycott (MAB). The MAB ended in September when the industrial action mandate...

Members of the University and College Union (UCU) at the University of Sheffield will take local industrial action for two weeks from 18 September, spanning the “Welcome Week” for fresher students and the first week of teaching. The strike is in response to a particularly tough stance on the Marking and Assessment Boycott that was in place from April until recently, which resulted in many striking markers losing their full pay for three weeks or more, and likewise for anyone who would not take on the refused marking, even if that was well above their normal workload. UCU is demanding that...

The Marking and Assessment Boycott in UK universities has been called off

In conversations at Lutte Ouvrière fete, we also learned about recent student activity

The Student Cost of Living Campaign held its summer activist weekender in Sheffield on 12-13 August

The higher education union UCU voted at its congress in May to hold a summer reballot