Students

Thursday

Michael Howard

A law unto itself

One could meet any day in Society Harold Acton, Tom Driberg or Rowse: May there always, to add their variety, Be some rather Odd Fish at The House. Thus W. H. Auden (something of an odd fish himself) reminiscing at a Christ Church gaudy half a century ago. There have certainly been quite a lot of such fish in living memory, not least in the Senior Common Room. In my time there was Robin Dundas, with his prurient interest in undergraduates’ sex lives; there was a law don who gave his tutorials in the small hours because he was too busy teaching elsewhere during the day; a sad philosopher whose

Alex Massie Alex Massie

In Praise of Alastair Sim

There is, I confess, little pressing need to post this clip from The Happiest Days of Your Life beyond the fact that a) it is always good to see Alastair Sim in action and b) this thought was triggered by this, entirely unrelated, story* in the Scotsman which quotes the head of Universities Scotland – a chap named Alastair Sim. The Happiest Days of Your Life, you will recall, is a splendid caper during which the exigencies of wartime demand a girls’ school be sequestered at a boys’ boarding school. Alastair Sim is the much put-upon headmaster and Margaret Rutherford the splendid headmistress. As always, Sim is the real star

Sunday

Matt Cavanagh

Immigration to fall in 2012 — but still not on track to hit the Tory target

Immigration will remain at the heart of political debate in 2012. Economic downturns tend to heighten concerns about migrants competing for jobs and depressing wages, and spending cuts tend to sharpen resentment over migrants claiming benefits or adding to pressure on public services. The latest e-petition to garner a hundred thousand signatures will get its reward of a day in parliament, debating the effects of immigration on Britain’s growing population. And while Labour and the Liberal Democrats might be reluctant to talk about immigration, the Tory leadership clearly see it as useful in handling those on the right who are unhappy with life in coalition — commentators as well as

Thursday

David Blackburn

New immigration figures

The Conservative wing of this government is on a quest to reduce net migration to, in the words of David Cameron, the “tens of thousands from the hundreds of thousands”. Liberal Democrat ministers may have dragged their feet on the issue, but there are serious doubts about whether Cameron’s policies will have any real effect. As Fraser revealed last week, the coalition is struggling to secure a substantial reduction in immigration, with foreign born workers continuing to fill many jobs in Britain. This poses a threat to IDS’ welfare reform plans, as well as an electoral quandary for the Tories.  New migration figures for the period from 2009 to the present have been published today. Coffee House is examining them at the moment

Saturday

Grace Palmer

An American view of tuition fees

When I visited the US recently, I got talking to some American teenagers about university. They (like me) had just left school and were trying to decide where to go next. I explained that in the UK, the Government’s plan to raise tuition fees to £9,000 a year had led to riots. Their jaws dropped. They couldn’t understand what the fuss was about. In the US, fees can reach $40 000 a year for the private Ivy League colleges. The reaction in the UK seemed ridiculous to them. They felt we should be grateful that we didn’t have to pay $40,000. [Although, to be fair, some state universities only charge

Tuesday

Daniel Korski

Across Europe, students are protesting against the end of their entitlements

A month ago I found myself in the space of one week in two different countries, yet in the midsts of what felt like the same phenomenon: the political awakening of a new generation. In both London and Rome, students took to the streets to protest against government policies in numbers and in ways that those who graduated just a few years before would have found anachronistic, odd even. Unsurprisingly, given the historical, political and even emotional differences between Britain and Italy, there were differences between the protests. But as I walked the packed streets, listened to the protests, read their slogans, I heard similar arguments – particularly about the

Tuesday

David Blackburn

The government takes the fight to students

The government’s response to the protest over tuition fee hikes has stiffened. Nick Clegg has written to Aaron Porter and David Cameron has penned an op-ed piece in the Standard today. They are united. The NUS should protest; debate is important. But that debate is moribund if the NUS deliberately misrepresent the government and mislead students. Cameron writes: ‘Of course these people have a right to protest. But I also believe they have a responsibility to know the full facts about what they’re objecting to — and judging by the fury that’s been unleashed, there are a lot of misconceptions flying around.’ It is vital that the Conservatives assist their

David Blackburn

Clegg fights back in tuition fees row

Nick Clegg has written a gloriously condescending letter to Aaron Porter, who hopes to recall Liberal Democrat MPs who vote in favour of tuition fees rises. Clegg emphasises that he was unable to deliver the tuition fee pledge in coalition, and therefore struck out to make university funding as fair as possible. After a wide consultation, it was found that the graduate contribution scheme is the fairest and most progressive outcome. He urges Porter to temper his language and not misrepresent the government’s position for political aims. ‘Grow up’ seems to be the unspoken request. ‘However,  I also believe that all of us involved in this debate have a greater

Sunday

Daniel Korski

Are they the children of the revolution?

The student protests are an important short-term development, which will undoubtedly worry the coalition. But are they also, as the Met Commissioner noted, a harbinger of something else: namely, a return to a late 1960s, Continental-style protest, which will encourage other groups – from Tube drivers to Tamils – to use sit-ins, strikes and ultimately street-based violence as a political tool. The NUS rejects that their tactics are associated with violence, knowing it will turn the majority of English people against them. Blame is heaped on small groups of agitators. Anthony Barnett argues that unlike in the 1960s, “the relationship to violence is also much better, as shown by the

Thursday

David Blackburn

The Lib Dems are in quiet turmoil over tuition fees

A cruel north wind heralds the Lib Dem’s discontent. In public, the party has withstood criticism of its apparent u-turn on student finance, helped in part by the more puerile elements of the student protest. Ministers, from both wings of the party, have stressed that coalition necessitates compromise: tuition fees had to rise; therefore, the Lib Dems’ task in government was to protect the poorest, which they seemingly have. Backbenchers hedged their bets, saying that they were scrutinising the legislation before deciding how to vote.     But consternation has reigned in private. This morning, weeks of whispered disgruntlement broke into open tension. Politics Home reports hat the Lib Dems met

Wednesday

Fraser Nelson

Five things the student unions didn’t protest against in the last 13 years…

1)    That Labour cut the number of schools each year. 2)    That pupils were shepherded into ever-larger schools. 3)    That, although the budget trebled, class sizes hardly moved. 4)    That the attainment gap between private and public schools grew to become the largest of any country except Brazil (Source: OECD ) 5)    And all at a time when the supposed funding per pupil was soaring… Moral: cash doesn’t help schools. Reform does.  

Wednesday

James Forsyth

The Lib Dems are spared by idiotic students

The violence at today’s student protest is, politically, a boon to the coalition. The story now is not the Lib Dems breaking their word but the storming of Millbank. The violence will also have cost the no-fees cause much public sympathy, we don’t like attempts at aggressive direct action in this country. There are questions that need to be answered after today, why were the cops so unprepared for the protest turning violent? I crossed through the protest at lunchtime and then it was quite clear that there was potential for trouble. I’m also bemused as to why it is taking so long to put a stop to the violence

Lloyd Evans Lloyd Evans

Cheating on the students

Writhe, squirm, cringe and cower. The Commons wanted to inflict ritual punishments on Nick Clegg today for his broken pledges on student fees. The plan nearly succeeded. With Cameron in China, (finding out what happened to our manufacturing base), Clegg took his place at the dispatch box opposite Harriet Harman.    Long practice has given Harman some skill, and even self-possession, at the dispatch box. She had an exceptionally easy target today. As she stood up to give Slick Nick a roasting, the streets around parliament were swelling with angry university-goers waving photos of Clegg signing his fateful election pledge on fees. The LibDem manifesto was being burned in public.

Peter Hoskin

The politics of the student protests

The student protests really are throwing up some extraordinary images. Who’d have thought that they’d end up smashing their way in to the lobby of Tory HQ, setting fire to placards, hurling bricks and other objects – and all as news helicopters buzz insistently overhead? It’s not Paris ’68, but it’s certainly not traditional British reserve either. I’d be tempted to say that this is the fury of a generation which, as I’ve written before, has generally been excluded from the political conversation – if, like Iain Dale, I didn’t suspect that this demonstration had been overtaken by a bunch of dubious fringe groups. So, instead, I’ll refer CoffeeHousers to

Thursday

Madsen Pirie

Gaining work experience

Twenty years ago, students typically took low skill “summer jobs” simply to earn money.  Now, most offices and organizations feature youngsters putting in unpaid time for work experience.  It might be a week or two, or even half a year. The practice has its critics.  Union leaders are decidedly edgy about free labour competing for jobs with their members.  There are charges of exploitation and bad treatment.  The caricature has unpaid interns working photocopiers or being sent to collect sandwiches or laundry for management, without gaining any useful hands-on experience. Some critics detect class bias in unpaid work experience, saying that only affluent middle class children can afford to work

Monday

Martin Bright

Reporting protest

Anyone who has ever been on a protest march or felt the heady frission of student rebelliousness should check out Hugo Rifkind’s piece in the Times today. A really subtle piece of reporting, with no hint of the usual establishment sneer. What’s fascinating about his observations the history of student revolt is how similar the present wave of sit-ins is to the protests of the past. The latest generation of student revolutionaries use the Israeli action in Gaza as their starting point but their real gripe is with global capitalism. They know as little about the realities of life in Isreal’s occupied territories as their precursors in the 1968 “events”