forced to drop out before graduation, or never even having the opportunity to take classes.
Many more have to settle for the cheap and cheerful education of a university in their own town while still living at home, rather than being allowed to gain the expe rience by moving to study in other cities.
Despite decades of struggles to ensure that the children of working people had the opportunity to get a higher education, this gain is being chipped away.
Many on the Labour back benches are opposed to further fees, and even in the cabinet Clare Short is voicing concerns. They are also alarmed at the prospect that top-up fees will vary depending on the "elite" status of the university, and that govemment funding will reinforce the split into a new "two-tier" system of elite and "bog standard' universities.
But we should not rely on people like Clare Short to fight against New Labour's education policies. The Socialist Alliance needs to campaign alongside students, lecturers, school employees, the labour movement and parents.
More money and resources for public education must come from taxing the rich, not working people. And if we don't see results, we need to turn up the heat, organise demonstrations, occupations and to challenge the very nature of this system, which places profit before education and • quality of life. Our car industry correspondent Many motor industry wage deals have just come up for review. Behind these reviews has been a rise in militancy due to an enormous increase in exploitation
The one deal that has been accepted, by a 2-1 majority, at Jaguar, is for four per cent for the first year, and three percent for the second year or inflation plus a half per cent.
This doesn't look bad when you consider the massive losses that Jaguars are making, but it also includes strings such as having to work an extra hour's overtime on the day following production losses caused by breakdowns. So arrangements for children, eating, meeting friends etc are secondary.
This is the point about many of the changes in the motor industry that have taken place recently: a worker's personal life is secondary to production.
In Peugeot in Coventry and BMW at Cowley, the workers are, like most of the rest of the motor industry on a working time account, banked hours system. This means that the Peugeot workers on a 36.75 hours, and the Cowley workers on 37 hours, both work regular 40 hour weeks.
The extra hours are "banked' and used to
cover lay-offs or holidays. These 40 hour weeks have taken the industry back many years. This, allied to new long shifts, and a huge increase in workloads brought in by "continuous improvements", has meant angry workforces.
In Coventry, the chief negotiator, and now deputy general secretary of the Transport and General Workers' Union, Tony Woodley, perhaps with an eye to the top job coming up soon, has recommended rejecting a two-year deal of three per cent each year.
In Cowley the officials and plant leadership recommended an across the board increase of £15 in the first-year and £10 in the second year in a two-year deal. There was also a small bonus in the second year, which most workers did not expect to get
This would have meant about a six to seven per cent increase on the company's wage bill. Considering how well the Mini is selling and the huge profits that BMW is making, it is not surprising that the workforce voted by 2 to I to reject this offer.
When the unions did a survey to determine the reasons for the rejection, the workers said that their main problems, ER that tenants had Jubllant: the campaigners celebrate with a sherbet
But the campaign also involved the loca unions - Southwark UNISON and UCATT - together with socialists from the local Alliance.
The turning point for the councillors seemed to be a fifty-strong public meeting which was attended by the leader of the invariably on worse conditions than the regular workers, earning 20 percent less in Cowley for example, and can be sacked by simply ending their contracts.
This means that though many are in the union, they are not in a position to fight alongside the rest of the workforce because of their insecurity.
In Cowley nearly half the shop floor workforce is agency. They are used in the speed up process, and to weaken any resistance. This is a new cancer right at the heart of union organisation.
These workers need contracts if this change doesn't take place then long service employees will be driven out, or disillusioned, and the employer gain total control on the shop floor.
Tony Woodley was at the heart of introducing working-time accounts - all in the name of saving the companies or plants. He was also the one who negotiated some of the agency agreements
If he really wants to change the union, then he would set about uniting the motor industry workers of Britain, and offer a joint campaign with the European unions.
This would have to end agency, and short term contracts, and oppose the working time account systems, and outrageous shifts. We have to get our lives back
In the meantime workers will continue to struggle at plant level, and it is up to the left to try to unify these struggles
Labour Group, and two