See below for the letter being sent to candidates in the London 2012 Mayoral and GLA elections on behalf of UCLU Postgraduate Association and many other London student unions, as part of UCLU’s wider campaign to defend and extend the rights of part-time PhD students. For more information or if you are a candidate, to make the pledges, please contact uclu-pga.officer@ucl.ac.uk
The Pledges
- “If elected, I will vote, work and campaign to extend student Council Tax discounts to part-time PhD students across the capital.”
- “If elected, I will vote, work and campaign to extend student Transport for London discounts to part-time PhD students across the capital.”
Pledging candidates
(N.B. All candidates listed so far agreed to both pledges, and the Green Party signed all of its candidates up collectively):
Mayoral
Jenny Jones (Green)
Cross-London GLA List
All Green candidates
Ealing & Hillingdon
Mike Harling (Green)
Onkar Sahota (Labour)
Enfield & Haringey
Peter Krakowiak (Green)
Peter Staveley (UKIP)
Barnet and Camden
A.M. Poppy (Green)
West Central
Susanna Rustin (Green)
South West
Daniel Goldsmith (Green)
North East
Caroline Allen (Green)
Merton & Wandsworth
Roy Vickery (Green)
Lambeth & Southwark
Jonathan Bartley (Green)
Havering & Redbridge
Haroon Saad (Green)
Greenwich & Lewisham
Roger Sedgley (Green)
Bexley & Bromley Brent & Harrow
Shahrar Ali (Green)
City & East
Chris Smith (Green)
Croydon & Sutton
Gordon Ross (Green)
Dear London Election Candidates,
We are writing as representatives of London’s part-time PhD students about the discriminatory financial situation facing these students.
PhD candidates are relatively independent researchers undertaking years-long projects that push the boundaries of knowledge and benefit their institutions and society. However, the majority of part-time PhD students are self-funded, relying on jobs held alongside intensive academic commitments, loans, savings and family assistance to pay not only their living costs, but tuition fees on top. In a recent survey at University College London (UCL), where part-time students make up over a fifth of PhD candidates, nearly 80% had no support from commercial sponsors or government or charitable funding bodies. Almost half of respondents were concerned that a lack of funding might force them to abandon their research and leave the university. In contrast, the majority of full-time PhD students are funded, for instance by the Research Councils (though cuts to this funding are also having worrying effects on access to higher degrees).
It is therefore concerning that part-time students are ineligible for the standard student discounts on Council Tax and Transport for London travelcards, which are offered to their full-time counterparts, and indeed these issues were repeatedly (and angrily) raised by respondents to the UCL survey. Criticisms of the situation ranged from “problematic” to “outrageous”. Discrimination appears particularly unfair when the criteria to qualify for these discounts are considered. A full-time course must require at least 21 hours of study per week for 24 weeks per year to qualify its students for Council Tax discounts[1], and “studying or writing up for 15 or more hours a week” for TfL discounts[2]. Part-time PhD students invariably need to study significantly longer hours than this, year-round, and yet they fail to qualify for these discounts on the technicality that they are designated separately to full-time PhD students (who would usually have no other significant work commitments and generally put in much more than a 40 hour week on their research).
These financial disadvantages for part-time PhD students come on top of their struggles to finance their own fees and living expenses, and have significant implications for the accessibility of higher education, for drop-out rates, and for the research outputs of our city’s universities. There are approximately 400,000 students in London, of whom over a quarter are postgraduates. Current and aspiring postgraduate students, their parents, and all Londoners interested in fair, accessible education, will be interested in your position on these issues as a candidate in the upcoming elections. Therefore, we are calling on all candidates to sign up to the following 2 pledges:
- “If elected, I will vote, work and campaign to extend student Council Tax discounts to part-time PhD students across the capital.”
- “If elected, I will vote, work and campaign to extend student Transport for London discounts to part-time PhD students across the capital.”
Please let us know your thoughts on these important issues by emailing uclu-pga.officer@ucl.ac.uk or writing to Ben Towse, Postgraduate Association President, UCLU, 25 Gordon Street, London, WC1H 0AY. We await your responses with interest.
Yours sincerely,
Ben Towse
President, UCL Union Postgraduate Association
Dante Micheaux
Postgraduate Research Students’ Representative, NUS National Executive Committee
Michael Chessum
Chair, University of London Union Senate
NUS National Executive Committee
Sean Rillo Raczka
Vice-President and President-elect, University of London Union
Simisola Smith
Vice-President Academic Affairs, King’s College London Students’ Union
Christopher Hares
Postgraduate Taught Campaigns Officer, King’s College London Students’ Union
Jamie Woodcock
Postgraduate Officer, Goldsmiths Students’ Union
Alex Peters-Day
General Secretary, LSE Students’ Union
Arianna Tassinari
Co-President Welfare & Education, SOAS Students’ Union
James Meadway
Postgraduate Officer, SOAS Students’ Union
Rob Scully
President, City University London Students’ Union
Ben Westhead
President, SUARTS (University of the Arts London)
Manojkumar Iyer
President, Middlesex University Students Union
Claire Locke
President, London Metropolitan University Students’ Union
Robert Tang
President, Graduate Students’ Association, Imperial College Union
Daniel Lemberger Cooper
President, Students’ Union, Royal Holloway, University of London
David Pavitt
Postgraduate Student Officer, Students’ Union, Royal Holloway, University of London
Annabel Jones
Chair, Birkbeck Students’ Union
Shakira Akther
Vice-President Campaigns, University of East London Students’ Union
Photo – Bruno Girin.