Students target Chancellor Osborne this time
Article published: Monday, December 20th 2010
Students from Universities and colleges in Manchester have made it clear that they will not take the rise in tuition fees and education cuts lying down. Last Friday, only two days after reminding constituents of Cheadle MP Mark Hunter’s broken promises, they took the protest to the home turf of Chancellor and Tory MP George Osborne.
In the form of a flash-mob of Santas outside Osborne’s constituency office in Knutsford, Cheshire, students donning Father Christmas’ traditional red attire and bearing sacks of coal protested against the Chancellor’s role in the rise in tuition fees.
In a statement, a spokesperson for the group said: “A market in fees and the threat of being left with a debt of up to £38,000 will be a regressive move for the widening participation agenda.”
The protest comes despite the vote on tripling tuition fees having passed parliament two weeks ago.
Sarah Kerton, a postgraduate student of University of Manchester said: “Santa Claus is a public sector worker too. Osborne’s regressive cuts will leave him no choice but to lay off elves and ultimately leave a lot of children disappointed. It may be difficult for Osborne, with his millions of fortune, to understand the common man, but we’re here in solidarity with Santa.”
The students also unfurled a banner calling attention to public service cuts, announced by the Chancellor in the October Comprehensive Spending Review.
University of Manchester Students’ Union Campaigns Officer Amanda Walters was keen to stress the detrimental affect that the abolition of Educational Maintenance Allowance (EMA) will have on college students: “Figures from the Institute of Fiscal Studies show that the EMA allows more students to stay in education and also increases the academic achievements of students receiving it. Scrapping this vital payment totally contradicts everything the Government says about fairness.”
As reported in a MULE investigative feature last week, the proposed scrapping of EMA could affect 8,000 16-19 year old learners in Manchester. The government’s reasons have been widely condemned by unions and research bodies, while the headteacher of a Manchester college has said that it “will cause great suffering”.
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