STUDENTS will confront the Tories this winter with a nationwide strike in protest at the axing of maintenance grants, National Union of Students (NUS) representatives announced yesterday.

The NUS national executive pledged its support for the initiative, which has not been seen in Britain since 1971.

Maintenance grants have allowed thousands of lower-income people to go to university but were scrapped this summer by Chancellor George Osborne, who deemed them “unaffordable.”

From September next year, maintenance grants will be replaced by loans worth over £8,000 a year — payable once students earn salaries of £21,000 or more.

NUS national executive member Sahaya James said: “With five years of the Tories ahead of us, we risk completely losing education as we know it from brutal attacks to an increasingly inaccessible system that shuts out the most marginalised and vulnerable, epitomised by the scrapping of maintenance grants.

“The student movement needs ambition, vision and a long-term strategy that educates, empowers and, importantly, wins.

“We have a duty to try every tactic and assert our power to save education.”

For the strike to go ahead, student unions in 30 universities across the country will have to call a ballot, with voting papers then being sent out to all NUS members.

Striking students would then need a simple majority to set up pickets.

Commenting on the extraordinary measure, National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts spokesman Callum Cant said: “A student strike is a necessary escalation for our movement.

“We have tried every other way to get the government to stop attacking education.

“We want to give students the chance to democratically decide what happens next.”

Student strikes have recently been seen in Quebec — against a tuition fees rise in 2012 — as well as Brazil and India.

The NUS executive has also decided to support a national day of walkouts in November, in solidarity with refugees trying to reach Britain and in protest at the government’s anti-migrant rhetoric.