The Diary of a Student Rent Striker

In 2008 we bailed out the banks. We now face the biggest financial crisis in a generation, with record youth unemployment. Who will bail out young people? Refinery29 and VICE are joining the NUS to call for all students to be offered rent rebates, and asking the government to bring back maintenance grants for students from low income backgrounds. 

Saranya Thambirajah is a first-year Politics and Sociology student at the University of Bristol. The 19-year-old started studying in 2019, before deferring because of mental health problems, and then starting afresh in October of 2020.

Thambirajah is being charged £145 a week for a self-catered room in halls, but is rent-striking. She has been instrumental to the campaign in Bristol, and is involved with Rent Strike. She shared her diary with VICE, recounting what she has experienced since deciding to take action.

October 2
I’ve got déjà vu. I’m in the car with my parents on the way to Bristol. I took this same journey the year before, with the car packed full of my stuff. Given this didn’t work out well the first time, I’m anxious. Strangely, I’m relying on some familiarity with how it was in 2019, but I don’t know what to expect.

I’m in a flat of five people in Culver House on Park Street. It feels empty – only two of the people I’m living with have moved in. It’s a waiting game, anticipating other people arriving.

October 5
I’ve got three hours of in-person teaching every fortnight, and everything else is online. We knew teaching would mostly be remote, but this is very few hours in front of a tutor. I find it difficult to study online – it’s hard to concentrate, and finding motivation is tough. I’m not alone: lots of people are feeling this. We’re doing a degree, but it doesn’t feel like we’re at university. We’re hardly ever on campus, we’re just logging onto Zoom or reading online alone in our bedrooms.

October 12
I’ve been added to a big WhatsApp group about rent strikes. I’m going to leaflet the halls about taking action. We knew studying would be hard, because universities hadn’t adequately prepared to deal with the situation. In the middle of a pandemic, having students migrating across the country, it is inevitable that cases of COVID-19 are going to surge. I believe we’re here primarily for financial extraction, with profit for the university prioritised over student wellbeing. Many of us are prepared to take action because we’re likely to suffer. Rent striking feels like the right thing to do. It might be the only way we are going to get the support we need.

October 19
I’ve tested positive for COVID. It’s spreading like wildfire through Bristol. Hundreds of students have it, and thousands more are isolating. I don’t have it that bad, but I feel ill. The isolation is horrible. 

We’ve received food boxes. We were told we’d get fresh food, but that wasn’t the case for us and for most people I’ve spoken with. It’s all dried and canned stuff, but you want to eat nutritious food when you’re unwell. We’ve got some food left in the house already, and if we didn’t it would’ve been hard to live off this for two weeks. I just want fresh food, a salad and vegetables.

October 24
The first £2,400 rent payment is due today. I am not paying it. More than 1,300 people have signed up. It’s the biggest student rent strike in history. People are upset and angry, so they’re willing to support anything that will help create positive change. We’ve put information about striking in every student accommodation group chat and every course group chat, to spread it as organically as possible, and that is really getting the momentum going.

October 26
We’ve got so many people involved that the university agreed to meet with us today. We demanded no repercussions for rent strikers, a 30 percent cut in annual rent, a concrete commitment to mental health care provision, delivery of sanitary products, transparency on security powers and nutritious food boxes.

Robert Kerse, University of Bristol’s chief operating officer, was not there, so we couldn’t discuss rent reductions and contract releases. The university management doesn’t want to relent. It is hugely frustrating, and we feel quite beat down. We never expected it to be easy, but we now realise we’ve got a fight on our hands.

November 1
We’re in a second national lockdown, so now we’re continuing to grow the strike virtually to push everything as far as we can. I’ve spent the day painting a huge banner in my kitchen. My flatmates have been helping too. We’ve got red paint everywhere. It reads: “Support students, support the rent strike,” and we’re hanging it from the bridge in Castle Park because of the high footfall.

November 3
We had our second meeting with the university today. Robert Kerse could join, so we discussed rent reductions, no-penalty contract releases and deposit refunds. We were just told the university couldn’t agree to those demands because of financial instability.

The meeting got quite emotional because we were talking about mental health, and the university management insisted they are doing everything to support us. It was a slap in the face. We’re on the ground and know that not everyone is supported. A friend’s flat went into isolation and not one had a wellbeing check-in, despite them all contracting COVID and two of them being on the disability services list for mental health reasons.

There were some wins for us, though, and the university agreed to meet some of our demands. They’ve committed to releasing information on security powers and checking on students three times during self-isolation – but only if they have tested positive for COVID-19. It’s disappointing that only students with a positive test are deemed important enough for a wellbeing check. There are many clear failures and students are falling through the cracks, yet the university is unwilling to acknowledge that.

November 5
We’ve received a letter from the management promising no additional repercussions for rent strikers beyond the existing policy on student debt, and to say they will hold a discussion with the board of trustees about no-penalty contract releases and deposit refunds.

November 12
Students in Manchester have occupied a university building. It’s amazing. This is bringing the rent strike movement into the mainstream. It’s getting loads of press, and the vast majority is supportive. The demonstration sets a precedent and will help us push our demands at Bristol. 

November 16
Today we’re hosting a day of action. In normal times we’d be protesting, but we’re in a pandemic. Instead, we’re sending an email storm to Hugh Brady, the university’s vice-chancellor. We’ve sent out templates to get as many people as possible to email him to reiterate our demands and show students will not be disregarded.

The university has emailed announcing a ten-day rent rebate because the government has told us to travel home early for Christmas. It’s not good enough; we’ve said from the start we want 30 percent annually.

November 19
The university has threatened to use students’ bursary money to pay their rent if they’re striking. We’re furious, and people are stressed about this. The uni is discriminating against low-income students and those who receive bursaries. They are trying to take away our ability to protest and have a voice.

November 20
That email about bursaries received a lot of press attention overnight, and the university has U-turned. I’m delighted, but it doesn’t forgive that they tried to use this shameful tactic in the first place.

December 2
The national lockdown is over and we’re upping our action again. We’ve designed and printed hundreds of posters, stickers and leaflets that we’re putting up around uni and halls to get more people involved. Things feel like they’re winding down because a lot of students are going home for Christmas.

December 3
The uni has agreed to give us 30 percent off rent for seven weeks, from the 19th of December to the 1st of February. We want 100 percent. We’re charged what is already an extortionate amount for services we’re not getting, or even half the usual university experience. There have been so many failures and students struggling, it would be compensation for everything that has happened, and it’s not just about when we cannot be in halls.

December 10
I’m leaving to go home. I’ve packed a suitcase to the brim. I hope I’ll be back in Bristol around mid-January.

December 22
The national rent strike is snowballing. A few of us from around the country are holding online training today using the Rent Strike platform. Loads of unis have now started strike groups, so we’re getting together to share resources and create a stronger network. We’re going to use the Zoom to help others learn about striking by sharing how we’ve taken action so far, how to organise at their university, how to deal with management and how to get support.

January 12
Uni has told us we’d get 100 percent rent rebates from the 1st of February to the 26th of March, but only for people who haven’t yet moved back. It’s a good step, but not good enough. The announcement came too late and many people have already moved back. There are situations where some students moved back to uni because they couldn’t afford to live at home, whereas if they’d known about the rebate they would have been able to stay. We’re still fighting for the 30 percent cut for everyone regardless of rebates.

January 25
Everything is happening fast – we’ve hit over 55 universities striking nationally, which is fantastic. Today we held a national online rally with some brilliant speakers, including John McDonnell and Owen Jones. It was hugely exciting. It feels like a good moment, and that rent strikes are now very much in the mainstream.

February 3
We had our first meeting of the term with the university management today. It feels like we’ve come to an impasse, but we’ll keep fighting. They’re not willing to budge, and we’ve still yet to hear from Hugh Brady.

February 4
I’ve yet to return to Bristol. Most of my stuff is there. Moving away from home for the first time is stressful, and I wanted to settle in my uni city. That’s impossible to do when you’re uprooted from it for such a long time. It won’t be long until I’ve been home in London for the same time as I’d been living in Bristol, it’s surreal. The only comfort comes from knowing we’re all in the same boat, but that doesn’t make it easier.

@emilysgoddard