By Corinne Glenn
At the National Union of Students (NUS) state branch conference on November 24, the Labor right (Unity) faction and the Liberals strengthened their grip on the student movement.
The Labor left in the National Organisation of Labor Students (NOLS) and Left Alliance had agreed to work with Resistance to win the position of education officer. Some within NOLS, however, decided to do a deal with Unity instead.
The result was that a "non-factional" Labor member won the position of president, Unity won the general secretary position, and NOLS won education officer. Resistance and Left Alliance had hoped to win positions on the state executive; however, the national liaison committee representing international students, and two independents voted for the Liberals, which gave the three executive positions to NOLS, Unity and the Liberals.
Unity's proposals for changes to the NUS policy document at the national conference later this month include eliminating any condemnation of HECS or "user pays" education, and replacing all references to "free" education with the words "equally accessible". Furthermore, in the international policy sections of the women's policy, Unity wants to delete references to East Timor, Bougainville and Burma.
NOLS is proposing changes which more concretely support free education, along with some actions to achieve that goal. Resistance has proposed an "Education for all, not just the rich" campaign that has many similarities to the NOLS proposal.
The contradictions between NOLS' policy and its preference deals mirrors unhappiness among many NOLS activists with decisions passed through the NOLS caucus. Perth Resistance organiser and NUS delegate Arun Pradhan told Green Left Weekly, "Under its current leadership, NOLS in WA has consistently sided with the right, damping potential campaigns and blocking left activists from taking positions".
At the conference, Resistance delegates successfully moved motions in support of the democracy movement in Indonesia, and for NUS to coordinate with TAFE students in the education campaign.