AFTER the successful lobby of the TUC in Brighton on Sunday, the Young Socialists held a meeting at 5.00pm of 100 youth and workers at Brighton’s Community Base, where speakers called for the TUC to call a general strike to bring the government down and open the road to a workers’ government.
Jonty Leff welcomed the meeting and said that the Young Socialists had raised the issues of jobs for youth, universities must be free and the defence of London Met students facing deportation as a demand that the TUC call action.
‘We led today’s movement and we dominated the lobby with the demand “TUC get off your knees, call a general strike”.
‘At the end of the lobby the slogan had been taken up by everyone.’
He welcomed members of the audience from Swindon, Norwich, the Midlands, Brighton and London and said, ‘We now have to organise all over the country.’
The first speaker was Paul Lepper, the editor of the Young Socialist newspaper.
‘This was a powerful lobby. Our slogan was the slogan of the day and our movement is right on the button.
‘We have to take the fight to the government and bring them down with a general strike.
‘This government has scrapped EMA and blocked a whole generation from education.
‘When youth are getting better and better grades at GCSE, they are then told, you don’t deserve an education.
‘Two years ago, young people took up the fight,’ he said referring to the student demonstrations which pulled in workers in the unions.
‘That was a force that could have brought the government down, but the leadership of the NUS is spineless and doesn’t want to defeat the government.
‘The TUC is no better.
‘Now there is fury: students are to be deported. This is a fury that cannot be contained.
‘That is why we have to build the Young Socialists and Young Socialist Student Societies. We will have the full backing of workers.
‘These struggles are all connected. Graduates have studied for three years and then there are no jobs.
‘We must make sure we are on the front line in every college and university, until we have free education and socialism as a right.’
The next speaker was Lukman Bello, the vice-president of the Students’ Union at London Metropolitan University.
He said: ‘I am here to bring to you the plight of London Metropolitan students.
‘This government says that international students cannot speak English and in the next 60 days, they are to be deported.
‘We tell the government we have the right to educate ourselves. We have paid large sums of money for this.
‘We make common cause with the Young Socialists.’
Joshua Ogunleye, the National Secretary of the Young Socialists spoke next: ‘We cannot underestimate the work we have done today, especially on the question of jobs.
‘At the TUC, this question is a sharp one.
‘In the NHS, there is planned privatisation, with doctors and nurses made unemployed.
‘At the Universities of Sussex and Middlesex, jobs are going, with departments like Philosophy shut down.
‘The uprising last year over the execution of Mark Duggan reflected that young people want to go beyond poverty and a system that offers them no future.
‘The government is involved in a slave-labour exercise. If you are young and a graduate, you get to the dole to be enrolled onto the Tesco workforce filling shelves as a slave labourer for a short while and then back to the dole.
‘That is their plan.
‘Young people will get nothing stable, and that is not what young people want.
‘It is just setting the benchmark at poverty.
‘Young people at London Met stand against this, as do the young people of Palestine, Egypt and Tunisia.
‘What is necessary is a leadership that will put this system down and go forwards to socialism. Taking the struggle to the TUC sharpens the fight up.
‘We cannot rest until the government goes.
‘We demand to go beyond this crisis and young people are in a struggle to change the world; this movement is ready to grow.
‘There is nowhere that capitalism has proved itself sufficient.
‘We must start our work in colleges and universities next week.’
He concluded by calling for the rapid building of the Young Socialists as part of the struggle for a general strike.
In the discussion that followed, Jack Booth from Swindon said that the government was taking jobs and livelihoods away. ‘We have to get rid of this system and build socialism. The banks have all failed. You can’t trust anyone with your money anymore. We have to turn it all around and fight for socialism.’
Sinead O’Cara from the Midlands said she had just been to Wexford where unemployed people were being forced to pay 120 euros a week in rent.
‘A lot of people will end up on the streets and this is happening in England now too.
‘The media try to brainwash us and the people behind it are capitalists. They promote slave labour.
‘The EU are pushing the same.’
Nash Campbell of the Young Socialists said that people want basic things like jobs and a roof, and this government cannot provide them.
‘The government is bringing in water cannon to come after us. We have to fight for jobs and education. Manufacturing companies are being shut down so that young people cannot get jobs.
‘We want to bring in our movement to get rid of this system and we have to build it in every school, college and university as the freshers fairs start.
‘We have our own schools to train ourselves.
‘When people are living out of bins, that is why we have to smash this system.’
Paul Childs, Young Socialists member from London spoke about his experience of Jobseekers Allowance. ‘All I am getting is £12 for two hours and I depend on my parents. We have to get rid of this system.’
Gabriel Polley from Norwich told the meeting: ‘We went to the TUC to tell them we have to fight for a general strike and socialism. The TUC delegates looked more like business people – that’s how they brush us off. They had to resort to the police to keep us out.
‘They are cynical and don’t want socialism, but we will organise for every college and university and build a young leadership in the trade unions.
‘Our slogan did dominate. They have been discussing a general strike, but they are not going to do anything – they are servants of capitalism and imperialism.’
He warned that the cuts in the public sector and attacks on universities meant there were no decent jobs for youth.
‘We have a world to win. Build our organisation and let’s have a revolution.’
