Digby Jacks (16 May 1945 – 21 October 2011) was a British student activist and trade union official. Jacks became the President of the UK's National Union of Students in 1971, serving until 1973, and was subsequently an official for the Manufacturing, Science and Finance trade union. Jacks was raised in

Charlton Charlton may refer to: People * Charlton (surname) * Charlton (given name) Places Australia * Charlton, Queensland * Charlton, Victoria * Division of Charlton, an electoral district in the Australian House of Representatives, in New South Wale ...

, south London, the son of a building surveyor, and read biology at

King's College, London King's College London (informally King's or KCL) is a public research university located in London, England. King's was established by royal charter in 1829 under the patronage of King George IV and the Duke of Wellington. In 1836, King' ...

, and gained a teaching diploma at the

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. He taught for a time at Holland Park Comprehensive School before his election to the NUS Executive in 1969. A member of the

Communist Party of Great Britain The Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) was the largest communist organisation in Britain and was founded in 1920 through a merger of several smaller Marxist groups. Many miners joined the CPGB in the 1926 general strike. In 1930, the CPGB ...

when elected NUS President, Jacks was the second candidate from the left, in this case the

Radical Student Alliance Radical may refer to: Politics and ideology Politics * Radical politics, the political intent of fundamental societal change *Radicalism (historical), the Radical Movement that began in late 18th century Britain and spread to continental Europe an ...

, succeeding

Jack Straw John Whitaker Straw (born 3 August 1946) is a British politician who served in the Cabinet from 1997 to 2010 under the Labour governments of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. He held two of the traditional Great Offices of State, as Home Secretary ...

, also elected on the RSA ticket, to win since the beginning of the Cold War: national student politics having previously been dominated by an anti-Communist alliance. Proposals from

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, then Education Secretary in the Heath government, which would have affected the union's autonomy and finances, were dropped after Jacks led a successful campaign mixing protest and argument. After his term as NUS President, he wrote ''Student Politics and Higher Education'' (), a book which examines the broad left's political strategy in student politics. Retiring as a regional officer for the

Amicus Amicus is Latin for 'friend' or 'comrade'. The word may refer to: Organizations * Amicus (trade union), the former British trade union, now merged with the TGWU to form Unite * Amicus Bank, a former bank based in Canada * Amicus Books, an inde ...

trade union in 2005, he was a Labour councillor in the London Borough of Hounslow until 2006 and secretary of the lobbying group

Alliance for Finance The Alliance for Finance is a trade union federation in the United Kingdom. The Alliance for Finance was founded in 1996 on the initiative of the Barclays Group Staff Union to encourage more joint campaigning and solidarity between the many trade ...

. Digby Jacks died in October 2011.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Jacks, Digby 1945 births 2011 deaths British trade unionists Communist Party of Great Britain members Councillors in the London Borough of Hounslow Labour Party (UK) councillors Presidents of the National Union of Students (United Kingdom)