In the wake of Healey's fresh attacks on education spending, the International Marxist Group Student Commission announced o ver the weekend that it will be standing a full slate of candidates in the elections for the leadership of the National Union of Students at this Easter's Conference of Northern Counties College and Vice-Chairman of the Tyne-Wear Area NUS, explained why he will be standing for ENECTE "Students are facing a desperate situation. The Labour Government is aiming to slash the intake of students by 200,000. Twenty three per cent inflation is destroying the value of the if you're lucky enough to get *Student teachers like myself face the prospect of a 15,000 long dole queue next September. Reactionary attacks are being made on the right of foreign students to stay in this country. But the Broad Left of the Communist Partv and its allies. which dominates the NUS Executive, has not prepared studCns to HiL Lnesc allacNs Before, they were buttering up Vice-Chancellors and 'progressive' big wigs in higher education who are responsible for implementing the cuts, and telling students that these people are Photo: ANDREW WIARD (Report)
STEVE FAULKNER our allies in fighting the cuts. They have campaigned against the lobby of the TUC called tor the day or tne cuts demo which points the way to establishing a fighting student-worker unity - the only way to reverse the cuts.
The Broad Left have argued that the lobby will embarrass tneu trends in tae trade union movement. In this way they tie students to betrayers like Jack Jones."
"The failure of the Broad Left to give real leadership to students - which must involve confronting the right-wing ¡cadersno wich is icaune tac whoie labour movement to disaster major reason why some students have started to turn to reactionary politics, added Val Coultas, an IMG member on the present NUS Executive who is standing for the Secretary's position.
"And the Broad Left has attempted to meet the threat from the right by signing joint appeals with the lederation of Conservative Students. What a joke. No wonder the right-wing Students for Representatives Policies are knocking at the door, when the Broad Left refused boint blank to campaien with the rest of the left in the NUS for the extension of union democracy throush the abol IOn orre eTenaR aia C CsaDus menE of the sovereignty of union general au students uae enenr nant awanst tne Broad Left is not a case of more militant than thou but a fundamental question of policies. It is for this reason that the IMG candidates differentiate themsel ves from the purely defensive "super-militancy" being peddled by the opposed, along with the broad Lent, Ene struggle for a sliding scale of grants to automatically protect students income this would be a brake on the struggle for inflation and last year's grant increases anyone can see who was right on that point.
worker unity is not simply a case of students trailing along behind any working class struggic, tne Noo nas to ugn nationally to establish joint studentcommittees to fight for a programme to beat that crisis. An aspect of this is the IMG slate's call for a programme of public works, including education building, to meet social need and provide jobs.
Alongside the struggle for better grants, against the cuts and for wac! democracy in the NUS, IMG candidates will be lignung tor women s ngats against British imperialism in Ireland, and against political repression in the Soviet bloc as an integral part of their election programme.
of struggle in the interests of students, and Red Weekly will be reporting on their campaign and political programme over the coming weeks. We urge all student readers to get their college unJOns o pack une vi sate dne mav o speakers to general meetings. Speakers can be booked tnrousn me wo suceni Commission, c/o 97 Caledonian Road, London NI For example, the IS has consistently against the effects of inflation. They said higher grants. With the present rate of inf At the same time, building studenttrade union and labour movement action All the candidates have a proud record TecorO Leading trade unions are being urged to support the publication of an independent retail price index for low paid workers and their families. This suggestion is put to the general secretaries of nine of Britain's largest unions in a letter from the Low Pav Unit. The letter points out that the Unit has for some time been critical of the Government's own Retail Price Index (RPI). A number of studies by the Unit have shown that the RPI underestimates the living costs of low paid workers and their families. Even so the Government has refused to conduct an official inquiry into the need for a separate cost of living index for the low paid. The Low ray unit nopes tnat tne unions wil back une construcuion and oudiication of a low wage earners index for at least a year. This, it is hoped, will be a sufficient time to persuade the Government to publisn additions to tne nrl The Unit's approach to the trade unions follows a survey, published in the latest Low Pay Bulletin of the way in which other European countries measure the rate of inflation. In France, for example, the Government published only one official index until very recently, but each of the main French unions produced their own. These all showed a persistentiv higher rate of inflation than the official index. Under this pressure the French Government has now announced that official indices will be published for different groups ranging from top managers to those on social security. In the light of the British Government's refusal to publish a special index for the low paid, the Unit suggests that British trade unions should perhaps follow their French counterparts in publishing regularly a separate cost of living index specifically designed to measure the impact of inflation on their lower paid members"
POOREST HIT HARDEST The refusal of the Labour Government to publish such an index should come as no surprise. The basis of the social contract as put forward in the Labour Manifesto and by incomes policy apologists such as ivicnael root is to protect tne tower pare The reverse is true - as figures published by the Low Paid Unit show. Its index registered an increase in living costs of the poorest ten per cent of households of 9.5 per cent over the first four months of last year. The RPI rose 7.7 per cent o ver that period. Between January and June 1975 the index for the poorest tenth rose 15.6 per cent compared with 14.3 per cent for the RPI. If the Government was to publish such an index officially, it would explode the whole myth of Labour's The working class has to be brought into action if the cost of living is to be controlled. Ine trade unions should support the Low ray unit s request, and a the same time campaign for the setting up of local committees of housewives and trade unionists to monitor prices. It is on this basis that the cost of living index, Yet the pro-capitalist policies which Jones then went on to sell to