Splintered students

Students have formed a united, coherent and powerful front against tuition fees... Now back to reality. The official NUS line is for income-contingent loans, although the union deviated from this when it negotiated with the Government to secure exemptions from tuition fees for the poor. The Campaign for Free Education is still opposing whatever the NUS executive wants.

The new Real Solutions Coalition for State Funded Education is not to be confused with the Real Solutions campaign launched a year ago that led to the adoption of the income-contingent loans policy. And now there is the Stop the Fees campaign, headed by two members of the NUS national executive, one elected on a Socialist Workers Party ticket and the other as an independent. Plans to picket David Blunkett at a conference at the LSE on Friday were marred only by the decision to cancel because of you know what.