Welcome back!

The Big News for this week:

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ALP Club General Meeting

Tuesday March 30th, 1PM

Babel Building, Room G 04 (near economics, Map Ref F 13)

The General Meeting will consider several issues, including the upcoming National Day of Action (a rally in opposition to the regressive Education Reforms spearheaded by Federal Education Minister Brendan Nelson), the Melbourne University Elections which were called on Friday afternoon (these elections will be to appoint a constitutional committee for the creation of a new Melbourne Uni Student Union).

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National Day of Action -- Fight the Fees!

Wednesday 31st of March, 1-2 PM

We will be congregating on the Concrete Lawns near Union House at 1PM. Then we will be marching down to the State Library on Swanston Street at 2PM.

The NDA is an action taken by students from universities across Victoria and Australia. It is to express our dissatisfaction with the education reforms being forced upon us by Brendan Nelson, which will increase fees by 25% and increase the number of full fee paying students to 30%. This is part of the Howard Government's neo-conservative agenda to privatise and deregulate our education system. It shifts the cost of higher education, the bedrock of a modern economy, to the student, rather than the upon the public, who are the primary beneficiaries of tertiary education. The increased financial costs of higher education will result in those from lower socio-economic backgrounds being unable to attend university and TAFE, condemning them to the viscious cycle of poverty and second-class citizen status.

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This week the Bullsheet was released and mailed out to ALP Club members. If you don't get it, or didn't get the last one (sent about a fortnight ago), please let us know (email Melb_ALP_club@hotmail.com).

To get involved in writing or otherwise contributing for the Bullsheet, email me (aw@vurt.net). I'm always looking for more articles.

Because of the huge cost of regular (ie, fortnightly) mailouts, it is likely that we will revert to a campus-only distribution of the Bullsheet. For extraordinary events and news, there will be mailouts as usual.

This means that we will need your help in getting the Bullsheet out to students on campus. Every second Monday (Monday April 5th is the next day) we will need some assistance in distributing the Bullsheet. Let me know at the above email address if you are able to help.

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