Students End Stage Sit-In Over Fees

A group of students protesting against Scotland's leading arts academy's decision to charge fees of £9,000 to students from England, Wales and Northern Ireland ended their sit-in this afternoon.









A spokeswoman for the group said it was "neither practical nor effective" to stay in the foyer of the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland overnight.

Around 30 students started occupying the building at around 11.30 this morning.

They said the protest was part of a rolling programme of "wildcat" occupations over Scottish universities' plans to charge fees to students from the rest of the UK (RUK).

The RCS, which recently changed its name from the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama, is to charge students from elsewhere in the UK £36,000 for four-year degree courses and £27,000 for three-year courses from 2012/13.

The Glasgow-based institution has said the charge reflects the exceptionally high cost of programme delivery in conservatoires, which substantially exceeds the £9,000 fee.

The sit-in at the conservatoire ended shortly after 3pm.

A spokeswoman for the protesters said: "By facilitating fee increases for RUK students the RCS is setting a dangerous precedent in Scotland.

"Despite promises from the SNP Government that Scottish students will not pay fees, we believe that the huge disparity in fees between Scottish and RUK students will become intolerable and will inevitably result in fees for all students.

"Whatever tokenistic measures are introduced, a financial market in education will always result in discrimination against those unable to afford fees, whatever the level.

"Education is a right, and must be free, as it was for generations.

"The Conservatoire's Student Union has abandoned its responsibilities by backing the decision by management."

Robert Gordon University (RGU) in Aberdeen and the Scottish Agricultural College (SAC) also made announcements on fees for RUK students today.

RGU adopted a "tiered approach", with three bands of undergraduate fees.

Business, management and social science courses will cost £5,000 a year, fees for art and design, architecture and built environment, computing, engineering, health and science courses will be set at £6,750 a year, while the master of pharmacy course will be the most expensive at £8,500 a year.

The Scottish Agricultural College (SAC) said fees for RUK students would be £27,000 for a four-year degree, with fees set at £6,750 a year.

The announcements came after St Andrews and Edinburgh universities set fees at the maximum level of £9,000 per year for students from the rest of the UK, meaning that a four-year honours degree at the universities will cost £36,000.

Aberdeen and Heriot-Watt universities also announced £9,000 yearly fees, although both have capped the cost of a degree at £27,000.

Glasgow School of Art also capped fees at £27,000 for a four-year course.

Currently, no full-time undergraduates domiciled in Scotland pay tuition fees at Scottish universities.

The conservatoire said the fee its board of governors has agreed is exactly the same as that charged by comparable conservatoires in England which offer four-year undergraduate degree courses in music and three-year undergraduate degree courses in drama and dance.

The conservatoire, whose alumni include James McAvoy, Robert Carlyle, Billy Boyd and Tom Conti, already operates an extensive scholarship programme.

It said that from 2012/13 it will introduce additional scholarships, which will be means-tested, for new undergraduate students from the rest of the UK to partly offset the introduction of increased tuition fees for that group of students.

Scholarships of £3,000 a year will be available for students from a household whose income is less than £25,000 per annum.

The RCS was not immediately available for comment.

Union Leaders Warn Of 'Long, Hard And Dirty' Battle Over Pensions

Ministers accused the unions of jumping the gun because negotiations on the pension shake-up are continuing.










Delegates at the TUC conference in London voted unanimously for co-ordinated opposition to public-sector pension reform. Leaders of 10 unions subsequently announced their intention to ballot their members on industrial action, and revealed plans for a nationwide 'day of action' on 30 November.

Trade union leaders warned that the dead will be left unburied and rubbish uncollected as they announced plans for the biggest programme of strikes for a generation over the Government's decision to cut public sector pensions.

Officials raised the spectre of the 1978-79 "Winter of Discontent" as another 10 unions announced that they will ballot more than 2m members on industrial action.

The first "day of action" will be held on 30 November, the day after the Chancellor George Osborne unveils his autumn economic statement. Action will include one-day walkouts to lunchtime rallies, and is expected to range from senior civil servants to dustmen.

Workers being balloted include firemen, hospital and ambulance workers, police support staff, teachers and lecturers, care workers, meals-on-wheels staff, prison officers, refuse collectors, street cleaners and cemetery workers.

Four unions representing civil servants and teachers held a one-day strike in June, and yesterday the University and College Union announced that 77 per cent of its members had voted in favour of action over pensions.

Students at 67 universities could face disruption from next month, including a work-to-rule by lecturers, who may set exams but refuse to mark them.

After the TUC conference in London voted unanimously in favour of co-ordinated action, 24 public sector unions agreed their detailed strategy at a "council of war".

They are preparing for a "long haul" running through to next summer, with warnings that the London Olympics and celebrations to mark the Queen's Diamond Jubilee could be disrupted.

"We are talking about something that is long and hard and dirty," said Brian Strutton, national secretary for public services at the GMB. "We are assuming this will be a huge setpiece conflict running for a long time."

Ministers accused the unions of jumping the gun because negotiations on the pension shake-up are continuing. They said the talks could continue until December so there was no justification for taking action in November.

Downing Street said the proposed action was "very disappointing", while Mr Osborne appealed to the unions to halt what he called "this deeply irresponsible action".

Ministers said they would not back down on their plans to shave £2.8bn a year off the pensions bill by 2014-15 as this would unsettle the financial markets. But they said they were open to "different ways of cutting the cake".

However, on the final day of the TUC conference, union leaders queued up to condemn the Government's stance and declared that the talks were making no progress.

Brendan Barber, the TUC general secretary, said there was "huge anger" over the pensions proposals and said 30 November would see "the biggest trade union mobilisation in a generation".

He added: "We remain absolutely committed, in good faith, to seeking a fair, negotiated settlement of this dispute so that this action will not be necessary. But the Government needs to understand the strength of unions' resolve."

Labour urged both sides to step back from the brink.

Angela Eagle, the shadow Chief Treasury Secretary, said: "Ministers must show a willingness to conduct proper and meaningful negotiations rather than pursuing a path of deliberate confrontation. But unions should also demonstrate they intend to exhaust every option of reaching a settlement."

Ruth Davidson Promises No More Devolution If She Wins Scottish Tory Leadership

Ruth Davidson has promised to draw a “line in the sand” on the constitution by promising the Scottish Conservatives would oppose more powers for Holyrood if she is elected leader.







Speaking at the official launch of her campaign in Edinburgh, she said the range of powers included in the Coalition Government’s Scotland Bill should be the final word on devolution.

She also delivered a withering attack on leadership rival Murdo Fraser’s plans to start a new right-wing party to replace the Tories, saying there would be “existential crisis, no wringing of hands” under her leadership.

But the 32-year-old estimated that it would take a decade to turn around the Scottish Conservatives’ dismal election performances and make the party a political force.

Miss Davidson also brushed aside concerns about how she could lead the current Holyrood group of MSPs, the largest group of whom have backed Mr Fraser and his plan for a new party.

Sir Jamie McGrigor has become the latest MSP to back him. But the leadership contest will be decided by party members, many of whom remain fiercely loyal to the Tory brand and deeply suspicious about devolution threatening the Union.

Mr Fraser remains the bookies’ favourite to replace Annabel Goldie as leader but has not ruled out supporting the transfer of more taxation powers to Holyrood after the Scotland Bill has been enacted.

This was vigorously opposed by Miss Davidson, who said: “The Scotland Bill currently going through Westminster is the line in the sand.

“The time for arguing about the powers the people want is over. It’s time now to use the powers that we have.”

The Glasgow MSP also claimed to be the best candidate to thwart Alex Salmond’s separation plan during the forthcoming independence referendum campaign.

“I believe the United Kingdom is a force for good in the world. I will make that positive case for the Union and together we will win as we have right on our side,” Miss Davidson said.

“No halfway house, no second question, no march to fiscal autonomy. When the referendum is done and Scotland in the Union has won the day, let that be an end to it.”

The early skirmishes of the campaign have been dominated by Mr Fraser’s assertion that the Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party has no future in its current form and must be replaced.

The Daily Telegraph has revealed how a jittery Mr Fraser has sent messages to hundreds of sceptical members trying to convince them this would not mean disbanding their party.

In an appeal to rank-and-file members, Miss Davidson said: “I have no interest in change for its own sake. We could spend the next 12 months discussing the internal machinations of the party.

“We could tie ourselves in knots. Alex Salmond would love that. Real change for the Scottish Conservatives won’t come from a new name.”

She added: “Under my leadership, there will be no existential crisis, no wringing of hands. Instead I want people to call themselves Scottish, Conservative and Unionist.”

Jackson Carlaw, a West of Scotland MSP also opposed to Mr Fraser's plan, is the third candidate standing for the leadership.

Miliband Goes For His Clause 4 Moment

Ed Miliband is set to try to implement the first major change to Labour's founding principles for 17 years at this year's party conference.












In a move with strong echoes of Tony Blair's Clause Four campaign, when he scrapped the party's commitment to nationalising industry, Mr Miliband will insert a clause that brands Labour "a force for social justice".

Early reports of the document suggest there will also be a subtle but potentially important change in the party's organisational structure – Clause One.

Instead of aiming "to organise and maintain in parliament and in the country a political Labour party", the party will "bring together members and supporters who share its values to develop policies, make communities stronger through collective action and support, and promote the election of Labour representatives at all levels of the democratic process".

While the change sounds bureaucratic, it could herald wide-ranging alteration to the way the party operates. Mr Miliband hopes to introduce new categories of members, salvage Labour's economic prospects and encourage community organising.

The idea, originally proposed by Peter Hain, chair of the national policy forum, could see a registered supporters network bring in people who are non-partymembers who are willing to work on single-issue campaigns, such as local service cuts.

It could also ensure MPs demonstrate engagement with constituents via their candidate contract and trigger a wave of community campaign training.

Members of the public could also register as supporters, rather than members, and have a say in choosing party leaders. Such a move would replicate David Cameron's moves towards local primaries, by giving non-party supporters a say in which candidates are selected.

The proposals are particularly interesting, given that David Miliband had planned to reword Clause One if he became party leader.

They could anger union supporters, however, given they are already wary of the new Labour leader after he mooted plans to reduce their voting influence at party conferences.

A Formula For The Break-Up Of Britain

When the Barnett formula was devised in 1978, it was meant to share annual Government spending equitably between the countries of the United Kingdom according to their populations.


















Unjust: Joel - now Baron - Barnett has advocated scrapping the funding formula he devised for Scotland

In the intervening decades, it has become nothing less than a grossly unfair tax on the English to subsidise lavish public services in Scotland.

This is because the formula has not changed, though the population of England has risen sharply over those 33 years, while that of Scotland has remained static.

The result is that the Scottish subsidy has grown to such an extent that even Lord Barnett, the former Labour cabinet minister who invented the formula, thinks it is unjust and should be scrapped.

New figures which we reveal today show that public spending is now £1,624 per person higher in Scotland than in England, up 15 per cent in just a year.

This equates to the average English family being forced to pay more than £400 a year to fund Scottish services, and that the figure is sure to go on rising.

The scale of the handout allows the Scots to enjoy benefits the English can only dream of – free prescriptions, residential elderly care, university tuition, primary school meals, hospital parking, and most recently cancer drugs.

The injustice is palpable and, unless rectified, it presents a real danger to the integrity of the Union.













Danger to the integrity of the Union: Scottish National Party leader and Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond wants full independence.

Recent opinion polls show fewer than a third of Scots in favour of independence. But in England, a clear majority believe it is time for them to go it alone.

If the Barnett formula is not reformed, resentment south of the border can only grow and it may soon be the English, not the Scots who demand the break-up of the United Kingdom.

Is it too cynical to suggest that is precisely what Scottish Nationalist leader Alex Salmond wants?

Harsh but fair

Even the leader of Britain’s prison governors has now joined the shrill chorus of liberal protest over tough punishments meted out to those involved in this month’s riots.

In an extraordinary and intemperate attack, Eoin McLennan-Murray accuses magistrates of indulging in a ‘sentencing frenzy’, likening them to ‘sharks when there’s blood in the water’.

He said guidelines were being flouted and defendants unfairly treated.












Flashpoint: Riots across London and other cities of England in earlier this month were among the worst scenes of civil disobedience in recent history.

There is no doubt that magistrates and judges have taken a robust approach. Of more than 1,400 people brought before the courts in connection with the mayhem, around 70 per cent have either been given jail terms or remanded in custody awaiting sentence — far more than is usual.

But what did Mr McLennan-Murray expect magistrates to do? Put them back on the streets to wreak more havoc?

Offences included aggravated burglary, robbery, violent disorder, assault, arson and even murder.

In their own right these are all serious crimes, but against a backdrop of indiscriminate looting, destruction and anarchy they constitute a serious danger to the fabric of society.

So, understandably, the courts came down hard on perpetrators, in many cases handing out exemplary sentences.

If punishments are deemed too harsh, there is a perfectly sound appeal court system to moderate them.

And precisely what does sentencing policy have to do with a prison governor anyway? His role is surely to contain, and where possible rehabilitate offenders, not determine how long they should serve.

Perhaps Mr McLennan-Murray should just get on with his own job and let magistrates get on with theirs.