founding member of the Socialist Teachers Alliance and Junior NUT vice-President, talks to Socialist Outlook's ROY LEACH about the future for the NUT and State Education. RL: Carole, your election in 1994 presented a major breakthrough for the Left. How do you account for your success? CR: In my election manifesto I made a clear call for support for campaigns such as the SATs boycott and support for restoration of Section 11 funding [Home Office money for ethnic minority children].
Defence of state education was a central theme of my platform and I believe this was a clear and attractive alternative to my right wing opponents. RL: Between now and 1996 when you take over the union presidency what do you see as the major issues confronting the NUT? CR: Without a doubt the funding of education will be the central issue.
We must campaign for funding on ine basis or need and challenge the market philosophy which is being introduced into schools. We must also put pressure on the Labour Party to make a firm commitment to restore a fully comprehensive system - this means scrapping Grant Maintained Status and City Technology Colleges, and bringing them all back under democratically elected Local Education Authorities. RL: How should the NUT relate to the growing FACE (Fight Against Cuts in Education) campaign ? CR: Of course the national union should unite with any campaign opposing the cuts, but the NUT bureaucracy is afraid of anything that they don't control - hence their refusal to support the national demonstration on March 25.
By ensuring that this demonstration is a massive success we will put pressure on Doug McAvoy, and pull the NUT into the campaign. RL: What about broader campaigns to defend the Welfare State? CR: It is clear that the entire public sector is being made to pay for the Tory crisis.
It is essential that we link up all the varied campaigns and reject any notions that one service can he saved at the expense of any other -all of the platform speakers at the Oxfordshire strike rally on February 14 forcefully made this point.
An obvious link that the NUT should be making is with nurses and other health workers who are having their pay held down by government-appointed review bodies. The move towards Trust-level bargaining in the NHS is very much the "writing on the wall' for education - first of all for GM schools and then the rest. RL: Do you see any relevance for a union like the NUT, which isn't affiliated to the Labour Party, in the current debate about Clause 4? CR: Of course! If we want a Labour government to be elected it must show a clear commitment to jobs and services which are run in the interests of the majority.
This means democratic control. Fifteen years of Tory damage to the public sector must be reversed and Clause 4 gives a clear and distinct direction for Labour to follow. RL: Finally, how do you intend to use your presidency of the NUT? CR: Campaigning! I'm not interested in just spending my time in meetings - I want to help turn the NUT into an active, fighting union which stands up for teachers and state education.
If I'm even only partially successful in this my election will have been worth all our hard work.".
SOCIALIST OUTLOOK No. 79 March 11 1995, Page 3.