EDUCATION IS A RIGHT

RMT helpline 0800 376 3706 :: january 2011 :: RMTnews 18 I am a member of both RMT and the National Union of Students and I am the first of my family to access higher education, which would have been impossible without the support of my union because of the already extortionate fees. The decision to increase tuition fees to £9,000 a year is an ideological one. This government is happy to pay for Trident which government estimates will cost between £15 and £20 billion, Greenpeace estimates at least £34 billion, and allow thousands of tax loopholes that enable the rich to avoid up to £120 billion in lawful taxes. Britain's military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq this financial year has soared to more than £4.5 billion, an annual increase of more than 50 per cent. Fee rises are part of an 80 per cent cut in higher education funding in the government’s austerity programme designed to ‘balance the books’. This is dishonest. The credit rating agency Standard & Poor’s said there is “no important distinction” for the UK’s credit rating between borrowing for the existing system and borrowing for the new one being developed by ministers. By 2015, new borrowing for student loans is set to exceed savings in departmental expenditure. This announcement exposes the lie that these plans are necessary to pay the deficit and follows figures from the Office for Budget Responsibility which show that the changes will actually increase government spending due to the extra borrowing to pay for the higher fee loans. Cutting funding by over 80 per cent is just a small step away from saying it is not the responsibility of the state to provide higher education. It is clear these plans are designed to create a market in education. These attacks on education have seen young people, trade unionists and activists take to the streets in defence of the right to education and RMT is right to support them. Education is a right and as such should be accessible to all of society, not just the wealthy few willing to pay. The right to education is enshrined in the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, is universally recognised and is integrated in many national constitutions. While many countries have ratified this international convention, including the UK, few have integrated this basic human right into their national constitutions or have legislated to ensure its provision. The assumption that the user should pay for this fundamental right undermines the very concept of a right. Education is the tool through which we can develop the skills we need to secure other rights and the power to hold government to account. The country is in the grip of a crisis of capitalism fuelled by the rapacious greed and reckless risk taking of the wealthy elite. It is their crisis and they are determined to make us pay for it through our jobs, our welfare, our education and other services built up through our labour, paid for by our taxes, run by us, used by us and of which they have no use, only the desire to profit from them. Out of the 29 cabinet members, 23 are millionaires. They act in their own class interests and their attack on our right to education is just one prong of an all-out assault on working people that will hit the poorest hardest and exacerbate the divisions in our already vastly unequal society. The class war is alive and well and they seek to disarm us by taking away our right to education, the cornerstone on which all other rights rest. RMT recognises education is the key to defending and extending the rights of working people. I have been on the outstanding political school and benefited from a week of education, debate and training of the highest quality. With guest speakers, from professors to campaigners, we learned about a wide range of historical, economic and political issues. We learned how to influence MPs, run a campaign, write a press release, argue, research and how we can use political institutions to further our cause. I would encourage all activists to get on the next course. Today, the right to education is denied to the working class and poor around the world. Now is the time to fight. Take to the streets in solidarity with the students. EDUCATION IS A RIGHT RMT member Eddie Dempsey, a transport worker and mature student, explains why the ongoing protests against education cuts deserve support