 Up until 1989, tertiary education was to all intents and purposes free in New Zealand. As long as a student passed their university entrance exams, the small registration fee of a couple of hundred dollars was covered in most cases by the bursary scholarship.
As well as this, students had easily enough of a stipend to live on without needing to get a part-time job. Without having to juggle study and work or worry about rising rents, students were able to get involved in sports, cultural activities, and activism.
Governments fully funded tertiary education in the post-war era as demand for skilled labour – in private industry and in public health and education – increased. But from the 1970s onwards, as the international economy stagnated, governments everywhere tried to push the cost of social services onto students and working people. This went hand in hand with a pro-business philosophy that aimed to stimulate the economy by cutting taxes and raising unemployment (and lowering wages).
In NZ in 1989, the Labour government claimed that the private benefit of education justified a fixed fee of around $1200. Compared with nowadays this may not seem much but it was seen by students as the thin end of the wedge and they responded by forming education action groups.
Students were not the only people to feel the brunt of Labour’s privatization policies. After six years of pro-business government, New Zealanders were sick of Labour’s harsh neo-liberal policies and desperate enough to vote for the National Party’s ‘decent society’. National never campaigned as a free-market party – they promised to abolish the fixed fee for tertiary students – but once in power they matched the worst moments of Labour’s misrule.
Far from abolishing fees, student debt exploded as fees rose year after year. Students were charged interest on their loans before they had even finished their degrees. 'Anticipated' student rolls were funded, as opposed to actual numbers(which were always greater). Students bore the brunt of the shortfall in funding as fees rose and courses became overcrowded.
A new era of student action exploded after the infamous police riot of September 1993. Students had surrounded the registry building, where University Council was meeting to set fees. Unwilling to face up to the justifiably upset students, councillors called in the riot police, who ran rampant over what had been a peaceful protest.
Even though it took years for the courts to condemn the police for using excessive force in 1993, student protest took off up and down the country, with marches and occupations everywhere.
That activism continued at high levels until about 1998, when a combination of factors – the upcoming election, disillusionment at National’s intransigence and, most importantly, rising workloads and semesterisation led to a decline in protests.
Many students believed a new Labour government would end their misery. These changes in work and living conditions, combined with the change in Government, saw activism collapse.
In 2005, Labour removed interest on student loans. This was hugely important in reducing the unfairness of loans. Students who took longer to finish courses (especially solo mothers and those who have to work part-time) and students who graduated to low-paying jobs ended up paying, through interest, vastly more for their education than students from wealthy backgrounds whose parents paid for fees.
But Labour made this concession while the economy was in recovery and the wealth of the richest New Zealanders was skyrocketing. During Labour’s term the National Business Review increased the “Rich List” threshold from $25 million to $50 million because there were too many new millionaires.
Under the Labour decade, fees rose seven out of nine years and student debt continued to increase. It now stands at $11 billion.
The user-pays model now saturates every aspect of universities. Whether buying food in the Union or course readers for exorbitant prices, or even printing for 10 cents a page, students are forced to pay dearly for education. Increases in numbers mean students have fewer resources per capita than a decade ago. Otago University Vice Chancellor David Skegg is over $1000 per day!
The National Government budget for 2009 had slashed spending for universities if inflation is taken into account. Meanwhile, Australia has increased tertiary funding despite the recession.
Why free education makes senseSocialists demand free education because it important for the development of individuals. It is a right. Everyone should be able to increase their knowledge and skills, not just the rich. What’s more, a modern economy cannot run without an educated workforce.
This is especially important now, during the recession. When unemployment increases, people often turn to education to improve their chances of getting work. Unfortunately recessions also make governments look to cut education. If our workforce is not up-skilled, there is no way that it can avoid becoming a low-wage,Campaign for better housing
Substandard flats are a well-known problem, especially in Dunedin. They have been regularly written about in the Otago University Students Association (OUSA) magazine Critic, and are the subject of another yearly OUSA magazine and a Presbyterian Support study titled Old Cold and Costly and the OUSA Stop campaign. Despite it being the focus of so much attention, very little has been done to improve flatting conditions. The official route for grievances – the Tenancy Tribunal – is supposed to be neutral (this in a situation where many houses are so cold they fall below World Health Organisation standards) but in practice often sides with the landlord.
The Student Housing Initiative is an Education Action Group campaign that meets at Otago University every week to organize students around the issue of substandard flats. This campaign group wants to organize, inform and equip students to deal with this basic issue that affects all too many students. We aim to target first years looking for flats about specific landlords and their respective properties. We plan to equip students with the answers they need to ask and the information they need to tell prospective flat hunters.
Our primary campaign is a poster campaign. We want to get the message out to students that if their flats do not meet the Housing Code it is not just their problem – it’s a problem they share with students in general and it’s a problem that should be solved by landlords. We will hold fortnightly stalls to inform students about the code and assist anyone who needs information about their flat’s conditions and we want to be able to inspect flats ourselves in order to assist students. exploited economy. Businesses do not wish to pay for education, and the government will not tax them for this purpose unless they are pushed into it. Over the last 20 years, the costs of research and development and of education have been increasingly forced onto working people through student loans and taxation.
Change from BelowWhile the government sets funding levels, university bosses are not passive victims. Their primary job is to pass as much cost on to students as possible. To reduce fees, we have to campaign for government funding through progressive taxation and against the university bosses who pass on underfunding. In the past almost all universities had groups of students committed to organising protests in defence of student rights – education action groups. Student association executives are kept so busy with bureaucratic affairs they are unable to lead a political fight. It's up to individual students to start education action groups on campus or join existing groups.
Rebuilding these groups should start from small, well-advertised weekly meetings and then move onto small-scale activities like petitions and writing letters to student magazines. While this is less exciting than direct action like university occupations, it’s from small things that big things grow. |
