University have been occupying the Administration Building on the campus, defiantly resisting all attempts to evict them and defeat the struggle they have been waging since the beginning of October. This fight has implications for students in every University and College of Education in the country. For these reasons it is important that all students realise the implications of the action taken in Reading and that they receive more information than has been available in the bourgeois press.
Government Education Policy The Confrontation with the University Administration by Reading students over hall of residence fees and accommodation policy must be seen in the context of the whole education-onthe cheap policy of successive Labour and Tory governments. The late capitalist economy needs a rapidly expanding higher education sector to produce highly skilled scientists, techniclans, economists, etc. but it is not willing to expend the necessary finance to do this properly. Thus the student popula tion of Reading University is planned to increase from the present 5000 to 8000 in 1980, but the planned building programme of university accommodation (halls of residence)
comes no-where to meeting this.
The consequences are already taking effect; more and more students are being forced onto the housing market in town because of the lack of university accommodation. So the Students Union "hall fees campaign" ceases to be a purely student issue, unrelated to what is going on elsewhere, for there is simply just not the accommodation available in the town. The housing situation in Reading is already very badonly 20 council houses built in the last 3 years! With ever more students looking in town for flats and houses, there will inevitably be an all-round rise in rents. Hence one effect of cheap education is expensive housing-and not just for students.
The Labour government abandoned any further State finance for student accommodation; their Tory successors have added their own sophisticated touch to this by suggesting that the present students should pay for future student accommodation. In order to build the current 3 extensions to halls of residences, which will provide about 400 more places, the university have committed students for the next 30 years to paying the interest on the loans they have raised. The loan service charge is El8 per student this year, and is certain to rise.
The response to this has been a campaign to boycott all hall fees in order to force the Administration to concede the abolition of the loan service charge and a radical change in student residence policy as a whole. The Students Union campaign was initially successful, insofaras 90-95% of students in halls have not paid their fees, but the University Administration have shown utter intransigeance on the matter, and have refused to talk on the four demands put forward by the Students Union.
After a fortnight of this impasse it was proposed that a means must be sought to bring the campaign to a head, if necessary by bringing the university to a halt until the campaign was satisfactorily concluded.
STUDENT UNIONS UNDER ATTACK The much threatened attack on students unions now appears to be imminent. Press reports about the activities of certain Tory backswood men could only have been given the prominence they have, as a run in to the actions of the government. It is quite clear that the first stage will be the prohibition of so called 'ultra vires' payments, an attempt to give legal gloss to the interference of the government in the disposition of the finances of a student's union. There are many reasons for the attack which I shall go into in a moment, but the activity which so raises the gall of the Tory backbenches is the growing practice of students unions, through the activities of revolutionary militants, to donate money to the various causes of the world revolution; from donations to guerilla groups in S. Africa and BanglaDesh, the financial support of strikes and claimants unions, to the more recent involvement in the Irish struggle. The argument amounts to two things. First that it is illegal for any body to sanction activities (in this case, finance) which are outside of or prohibited by the constitution of that bodywhat the precise content of this is will be revealed with the conclusion of the current legal case in which Sussex Union is involved. And, secondly, the fact that Students Union finance comes directly from so called 'public' monies-in particular the levy which local authorities pay to the Unions for each individual student. It is supposed to self evidently follow from this that student union finance is then 'accountable' to the 'public' whoever they might be. The force of this latter argument is, of course, accepted by the NUS. But the "public' always turns out to be the ruling class and appeasement inevitably means capitulation, a situation which lays the basis for yet further attacks. Nor are the NUS any more realistic as to how to fight the former argument, proposing all manner of legal dodges through such things as the utilisation of the 'Juke box' fund (i.e. monies gained by the Unions, in their own right, through trading activities of one sort or another) for the payment of political donations; through the changing of constitutions or more generally the exhortation The Occupation On Tuesday 19th October the Students' Union decided by an overwhelming majority to occupy the Administration Building, Whitenights House. It was proposed that the occupation should take effect immediately for maximum impact, but the final decision was to occupy at Il a.m. the following morning.
A token force occupied at 9 a.m. on Wednesday and met with no resistance. Unfortunately this token force was not strong enough to prevent the authorities from locking almost every internal door, removing certain files and evacuating all staff from the building.
10 days later, at the time of writing, the situation is basically unchanged: although the Administration is being greatly inconvenienced, no offer of meaningful negotiations has been made.
What Comes Next?
No doubt under pressure from the Administration, the resident Head Porter has obtained a court order which prevents students from blocking or barring any entrance to the building. Since the university's solicitor was present in court, at the time the order was issued, it seems clear that very soon legal proceedings will be started to evict students from the Administration Block, by force if necessary. In purely formal talks with the students' elected negotiating committee, the Vice-Chancellor has made it clear that he is not ready to concede, but rather, that he is willing to take any measures to destroy the campaign and defeat the occupation.
A Counter-Strategy Solidarity has already been expressed by dozens of universities and colleges over the country, but this is not sufficient. It is obvious that students in Reading cannot win along: the onus is on other students, in the first instance, to take up the struggle. Other universities, notably Surrey and Lancaster, have had similarly reactionary fees structures imposed on their students. Students in Dublin have occupied for a similar reason.
It is not enough merely to look to Reading: students elsewhere must look at their own fees for esidence; in many cases they will find a loan service element which is included in the total.
In Reading we are making attempts to contact local trades unions for their support. The UPW has already responded to an appeal to black all mail to the Administration (largely as a result of student support expressed during the postmen's strike earlier this year), and the Trades Council is being approached. Spartacus League comrades are maintaining a vigorous political intervention inside the occupation to combat any illusions about a victory through compromise and conciliation.
Steps are being taken to organise an effective defence of the building by all the students affected by the hall fees increase. If this campaign is to be won, it will be won through unity, determination and active solidarity from without and within.
-Reading Spartacists But this is no way to tackle the problem. In its essence, it is not a matter of legality but of politics. These tactics can only University Administrators locked out of Administration Building.
require a much greater centralisation of the union which would need very often a doctoring of individual constitutions.
The reason why it is propitious now for the bourgeoisie to go