Speakers (personal capacity) include: • ALICE MAHON, MP • JACK JONES (National Pensioners Forum) • SUE LISTER (Chair, FACE) • DOREEN CAMERON (NATHE)
• CAROLE REGAN (NUT/STA) • ALAN SIMPSON MP Manning Hall, University of London Union, Malet St, London WCI HEALTH chiefs in Barnet, and Brent, many of whom had backed the vigorous Hands Off Our Hospitals campaign.
This breaks a run of retreats and concessions by health chiefs across the country, as plans for high profile closures have stirred deep-going public anger.
The Edgware closure vote runs alongside the surreptitious decision of health chiefs in South East London to proceed with the run-down of Guy's Hospital even while they hold back the closure of the casualty unit until after the next general election.
It seems that the more incidents and reports expose the folly of Tory health cuts in London and the dire shortage of beds for emergency cases, the more desperately keen health chiefs have become to force through their closure plans.
Many of the campaigns already established have shown the scope to link community organisations, unions and political parties. The fight must be stepped up now!
THE MARCH 25 demonstration against cuts in education will be the first national protest on this issue in many years. The march has been called and organised by an ad-hoc campaign, Fight Against Cuts in Education (FACE), launched only two months ago. Socialist Outlook spoke to SUE LISTER, national Chair of FACE, and a chair of governors in Oxford. SO: 1 gather the police are telling you the march will be very big? SL: Yes, we were originally hoping we might get around 20,000.
But when we went to discuss arrangements with the Metropolitan police, they told us it was certain to be more than that. It must be the only time a police estimate has inflated the numbers on a protest. They even told us it was a 'good cause'!
I think the march will be a genuine show of strength from all over the country. Oxfordshire alone is sending 15-20 coaches, with the same expected from Warwickshire. There is a bit of rivalry there - I think Warwickshire are determined to send more than us.
We have also heard that there will be coaches from all over Wales as well as England. Even towns like Leeds where there are no cuts are sending coaches to back the protest.
The FACE mobile phone which takes all our messages has been ringing literally all the time. SO: Where is the support located? Is it mainly parents? SL: Yes, the numbers are almost all coming from local groups of parents and school governors, sometimes organised as local campaigns, and sometimes just looking to support the national protest.
But most of the financial support we have had so far has come from teaching unions, mostly NUT branches - despite attempts by their national leadership to limit support for FACE.
NUT members have recognised the importance of this fight, even though our campaign is not primarily aimed at teachers. One London NUT branch has financed a brilliant poster. While they would like the money back, they have said that if need be we should just use the poster:
Our finances have been very stretched in organising the national demonstration - with costs like the PA system. Many of these expenses have been underwritten by London NUT branches to make it possible to go ahead, although obviously they will want the money! SO: London branches? Surely most of the big cuts are outside London? SL: There are very big cuts in parts of London, too.
In Camden for example some schools are facing budget cuts of up to £100,000. Lambeth is making cuts. And many London schools have been hit especially hard by the underfunding of the teachers' pay award. SO: What scale of cuts are being suffered outside London? SL: One school in Derbyshire was given a budget. which means that out of an establishment of 80 teachers, 17 would lose their The entire board of governors walked out and resigned en masse. Of course some get away with smaller cuts. SO: What has happened on the issue of deficit budgeting? SL: This is now so widespread that it hardly rates a mention in the news any more.
Of course when the first school set a deficit budget -Wheatley Park school in The opposition to education cuts reaches far wider than the traditional left circles of activists Oxfordshire - it was na- March 25 is their demontional news. Now so many stration. have followed that it isn't As you know, the NUT even reported in local pa- General Secretary Doug DeTs. McA voy put out a circular This is very important. to branches implying that Most local authorities now FACE was some kind of admit that if more than four front for the SWP. or five local secondary Now the SWP have put schools set delicit budgets out posters and leaflets with they will not have the re- Socialist Workers Party at sources to intervene in each the top and details of the of them. Of course the march. Some of them say in LEAs have been cut as well. small letters at the bottom that the demo is called by SO: What kind of support FACE, but even this is done is there from left wing or- in such a way as to suggest ganisations? that it is really them. SL: Most of the left are ob- This is a real problem for viously backing the demo us, because support for this and local activities. I'd be campaign is not the tradisurprised if they didn't. tional leftie support: many But there is a problem of those coming to the meetwith the way in which ings and organising for some, especially the Social- March 25 are middle of the ist Workers Party, have put road, apolitical and even out material implying that right wing people who are concerned about their children's education.
They don't want anything to do with the SWP. Indeed many of us on the left don't want much to do with them either.
We are trying to build a genuinely broad campaign on the specific issue of education cuts.
So far wẹ have succeeded. But many of those running FACE locally and nationally are not members of any party at all, even the Labour Party. Our campaign has been described as 'the rise of middle England'.
We don't want to have to waste our time and energy explaining to everyone that we are not an SWP front organisation, or contacting some of the organisations which have supported us to reassure them It's our campaign as parents and governors.
We are happy for the SWP - and anyone else on the left - to support us as long as they don't try to take it over, or give the impression they already have. SO: What next after March 25? SL: The fight is far from over. FACE will be fighting on until we reverse these cuts.
We are calling a national one-day conference in Coventry on June 1: The details are still be worked out now, but they will be publicised on the demonstration. It will be open to local campaigns, to unions and other organisations and to individuals. We hope it will be very big.
There will also be more local activities across the country, especially to build support for those schools which have adopted deficit budgets, but also to resist cuts and redundancies in schools which have not.
The tempo of national SOCIALIST OUTLOOK No. 80 March 25 1995, Page 5 leadership meetings will slow down a little when we have had the demonstration, but we will continue producing a regular newsletter to local groups, holding meet-. ings, issuing press releases, organising letter-writing, and seeking publicity. SO: Can you explain a littie about the new logo for the FACE banner? SL: Yes, we had a number of suggestions put to us by a graphic designer who backs the campaign. face with spiky hair but In the end we chose a only one eye. It is a 'smiley face' - but not smiling.
Some of us are a bit worrica inal unis mignt be seen as getting at people with disabilities - but the image is effective. I haven't shown it to anvone wao nasallmalsediately asked 'Why has it the cuts that they effectively disable children by denying . them proper education. And one of the areas worst cut is special needs support, because it's the easiest to cut without interfering with the national curriculum. SO: Have you had any support from the Labour Party? SL: We haven't asked them for any, but they haven't been very forthcoming.
Education cuts are political, but the FACE steering committee is not party political, not least because I think we're all fairly certain • that if we had a Labour government in office we'd probably be fighting a similar EDUCATION CUTS battle now.
We're under no illusion that we're just fighting the Tories, and we have to be willing to fight any government that fails to fund education.
Apart from trying to dissuade NUT members from staging protest strikes, David Blunkett has not had much to say. He has only really argued about the underfunding of teachers' pay, which in most areas is a tiny fraction of the cuts. In my school the cuts this year are f40,000, but only £6,000 of this is from the pay award.
Of course teachers' pay is important. Their increase should not be funded through loss of jobs. But the main issue is an increase in overall funding for education, and on that Labour is silent. SO: And in conclusion? SL: Be on the demo. Come to the conference. Build local campaigns. And get us a donation, so the fight can
SOCIALIST OUTLOOK No. 80, March 25 1995, Page 6
cuts in education FACE can be contacted by phone on 0589-789104
only got one eye?' It's an important part of