On Thursday 9 December, while parliament debated the Con-Dem coalition government's plan to treble university tuition fees, a fourth day of angry protests took place across the country. The debate ended with MPs disgracefully voting to increase fees to a higher limit of £9,000 a year, with 323 in favour and 302 against, and so the campaigning against this attack must now continue and be stepped up.
In central London, 35,000 students and education workers, many from outside London, marched to parliament to show their strong opposition to education cuts and increased tuition fees.
However, demonstrators were faced with very heavy policing, and the use again by the police of kettling, on what was a very cold day.
The recently launched Youth Fight for Education campaign (YFE) held an impromtu rally during the demonstration, with speakers from the YFE campaign itself, London RMT regional secretary Steve Hedley, and student activists from Hull, Cardiff, London and elsewhere.
As well as fighting against higher fees, YFE is demanding that the educational maintenance allowance (EMA) is retained and that teachers and lecturers' jobs are not cut.
YFE promised that if parliament voted for higher fees, the campaign against this attack would go on, as will campaigning against all the other attacks on education.
Protests elsewhere in the country included: 2,000 marching in Newcastle, 300 protesting in Swansea; a 50-strong demonstration in Leicester; 250 school and college students marching through Coventry - including 25 'year 11s' who walked out of Coundon Court school.
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