Public meeting at Goldsmiths, London: OCCUPIED!

For once, Oisleep is onpoint. I agree with the general tone of criticism as does everyone else from the group, but considering how a bunch of our mates and other interested students will (hopefully) come along, it would be counter-productive to ignore the "occupation" a few months back. I'd actually maybe even take the opportunity to make a few pops at how "we" did it in the Q&A.

Er a couple of people were taking notes...I'll see if I can't get a writeup. I'm not sure it'd be fair to ask someone to summarise the discussion though, seeing as how it lasted 2 hours or so and had various tangents, angles and conclusions.

From memory, 40-50 people (split roughly half and half between students and non students) listened to quick presentations from a parent occupier of Lewisham Bridge Primary School, an activist from the Charlotte Turner campaign from Greenwich NUT and an occupier from London Met and Unison (unfortunately noone could make it from Visteon cos of their celebratory party...don't blame 'em heh). All 3 gave context to their struggles and spoke about the successes and failures they have had thus far and what will happen next.

Then there was a free-flowing and largely unfettered discussion on a variety of subjects, including the role of the unions in these and other education sector struggles (with there being a general consensus - even from the two unionist speakers - that they mediate and undermine struggles and that the union bureaucracy represents another obstacle of direct action), the potential for school occupations as a medium term strategy rather than as a temporary protest (with reference to free schools) and responses to the impending academies Goldsmiths is funding in Lewisham. There were also contributions from members of Defend Council Housing on their brief occupation of a council flat in Streatham, the possibility of a social centre in New Cross once again reared its head, and we heard from a student from UEL who had occupied a few months ago over Gaza. A couple of Goldsmiths students also spoke - critically, of course - about their own experiences in Goldsmiths' fleeting and somewhat farcical "occupation" in February.

Finally at 9.40 odd we were kicked out by security who wanted to lock up. By the end the poorly ventilated and stuffy room was quite uncomfortable, although the vast majority of attendees stayed till the end so I don't think the meeting's length was a problem. Lots of fruitful discussions in the pub, although I wasn't party to most of them cos I was drunk and exhausted by that point.