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Salient. Victoria University of Wellington Students' Newspaper. Volume 31, Number 17. July 23, 1968

ever been had? asks biggs

ever been had? asks biggs

Have you ever been had? If you were one of those who marched to Parliament the other week to register your demand for better bursaries and accommodation then you have been had. You have been had by ambitious student politicians who united causes, amalgamated student demands with those of other groups, and eventually ended up denying responsibility for the violence resulting from the union.

There is a hard core of marchers at Victoria, people who will demonstrate for almost any cause. It is not a large group, and it is certainly a small share of the group which marched. The actual count of marchers have varied from 550 to 1200. Whatever the numbers, two points merit attention. Firstly, this was a healthy turnout, and I suggest that it was healthy essentially because of the unique student issues, bursaries and accommodation. Secondly, there were many in the student march who were not students — 'People's Voice" sellers and assorted other hangers-on.

But what was the end result? The bursaries issue was swamped in protest and violence connected with another cause. The leading banners were loudly proclaiming worker-student solidarity. anti-Seato, burning napalm, Vietnam, and a wide range of leftwing bogies. Sure enough, the banners did just enough to signify that a fair proportion of the crowd were students, but they did little to suggest just why many students were there. The BBC mentioned that evening that students and workers were present and that there was anger at a wage claim being rejected. but nothing was said of student demands. Local press coverage was similar. The Evening Post of the following day gave extensive space to the disturbance, but of student demands there were only one smallish incomplete photo of a female student with a caption indication the cause of her presence. In a scathing editorial reference was made to 'ostensible reasons' for the student protest. The bulk of reporting gave great prominence to students but only because it linked them with the violence. The Auckland Herald featured the demonstration prominently on its front page. Student claims, as distinct from student violence, rated two and a quarter lines compared to an esoteric banner attacking Mayor Love of Petone which made three lines of type.

Who was responsible for arranging the shotgun marriage of student and worker? Politically ambitious Tony Haas, the man with contacts at Trades Hall, invited Potgut Douglas, trade union leader, to speak to students. Owen Gager got up and quacked about solidarity with the workers, this being the latest in a long line of causes he has espoused. This was good stuff, a king size demonstration which would be the panacea to cure all social ills short of bringing down the capitalist system. I wonder if Gager will now stand for City Council in the forthcoming local body elections? A Haas-Gager ticket with a policy of demonstrating against rates at the town hall and the abolition of exploiting capitalist parking meters would guarantee election.

But there were other individuals, recently student politicians, who were eager to promote the unity of causes in a king size demonstration. These were not students. These men were connected with the PPP conference, men who had Bobby Kennedy style haircuts, men who had earned an aura of respectability for a well run profitable conference. This was the type which attempted to control the crowd at Parliament. This was the type which moved from place to place amongst the crowd inciting the truck drivers and wharfies to charge the line of police at the bottom of the steps and who initiated the first heave against the weakest part of that line—containing a policewomen —from the relative immunity of two or three rows of people. This was the type which chanted "six have been arrested" but did not have the courage of their convictions by joining those in the police wagon. This was the type which idiotically wanted to charge a police line at the bottom of steps —if you break the line you can't recover balance running up steps, you fall under the weight of those behind you and get trampled —but which stayed well out of the front line of demonstrators. This was the type which urged the crowd to damage limousines In short, this was the type which cost students a bursary claim and a sympathetic public ear for the next two years.

The whole scheme was ill-conceived and abortive. The timing was poor—student arrived when many workers had been and gone, and there could be no doubting the prominent role of students in what followed. The idea of a grand alliance between worker and student misfired. Workers on The Terrace hurled abuse at the machers, and in the crowd which formed, students were booing trade union leaders, and workers were heckling s'udent leaders. There was little unity, and it is unlikely that any but the most militant trade unionsists will consider joint action along these lines in future.

The crowd was treated lo the usual minority platitudes of "victory" and "on to future successes" but such meaningless phrases won't do anything to raise the student image from the mud which was once the parliamentary lawn. The whole performance can be seen as a demonstration of hothead crowd manipulation, of political ambition, of ulterior motive, of the lunatic fringe "student activist".

—Devon Biggs.