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AT LAST week's National Union of Students conference, Labour Party members swept into the leadership of the NUS, taking four out of the five full-time NUS posts.

Three of these candidates, including the new NUS president, were elected on a National Organisation of Labour Students (NOLS) ticket; the fourth, Sarah Veale, was elected as a Socialist Students' Alllance candidate, deteating the 'Left Alliance' contend er officially backed by NOLS.

These gains marked the end of over 15 years rule of NUS by the Broad Left alliance.

Despite this success, NOLS gave little cause for confidence that they will be able to provide a different sort of leadership - ie. a fighting leadership.

An important battle was lost in the student union financing debate. Student unions have already lost their financial and therefore political autonomy. The motion launched by conference dodged the need to launch a campaign to force the government to change the law.

Instead, it recommended that each student union should secure its autonomy by agreement with the college authorities.

Continuation

In many cases, this tactic would be correct as part of a wider national campaign. But it was proposed instead of a campaign.

A continuation of the practices of the old Broad Left/Left Alliance leadership was again in evidence in the elections for the NUS delegation to the annual meeting of European student unions, to be held in Moscow later this year.

The student wing of Solidarnosc will not be represented at this meeting but the Stalinist states' stooge student unions will be there.

The Solidarnose student union appealed for the NUS not to send delegates, and revolutionaries at the NUS conference took up this appeal.

Attempts to prevent the election taking place did not succeed. Boycott candidates then stood, but in the middle of the election outgoing NUS president David Aaronovitch ruled that any boycoti candidates elected would be deemed to have resigned. Their places would be taken by the candidates with the next highest votes.

A third of the delegates then left the conference, determined to have nothing to do with the election.

But the NOLS delegation candidate, Ruth Cadbury, declared that if elected she would attend the Moscow meeting.

Clear policies

So although the names have changed on the NUS executive, there is no decisive change yet from iance leadership.

Socialist Organiser supporters in NOLS must work for the implementation of clear and active policies, and for the conversion of NOLS into a campaigning JANE ASHWORTH FOR THE first time in this year's pay campaign, the leaders of the National Health Service unions, through the TUC Health Services committee, are calling for coordinated national action.

On Wednesday afternoon

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the policies of the old Com- munist Party/Liberal all-