'Student life' parts 1/2, c1972
About ten years on from the comparatively conformist student world of This is your union, this is a more loosely structured film focussing on speeches and noisy demonstrations against the Conservative government's proposal in 1970 to appoint a registrar for students' unions and to restrict their activities. A combination of negotiation and agitation led to the proposal being dropped in January 1971.
Because the National Union of Students was hoping to join the Trades Union Congress at this time, the government's attacks on trade unions and students' unions are portrayed as being linked. References to Northern Ireland and the events in France in 1968 are also used to support the idea of an identity of interest between students and workers against reactionary forces.
Sub-titles were added at MRC in September 2023.
From the archive of the National Union of Students [MSS.280/157/5].