STUDENTS have launched occupations at four universities to demand refunds of rents and tuition fees paid during lockdown. They took over campus buildings at the universities of Manchester, Sheffield, Sheffield Hallam and Nottingham on Thursday evening. The action follows occupations last year in protest at students being recalled to university, only to be locked in their halls of residence, denied face-to-face teaching and kept under watch by police and security guards on campus. In a joint statement, the occupiers told the Morning Star: “This escalation comes off the back of the largest British rent strike in 40 years where students, angry at collectively paying over £1 billion for empty rooms, withheld payments to their landlords.