Thousands of students take action against cuts and fees

http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2010/11/468456.html

Birmingham Uni is in occupation.

And Plymouth:
http://www.justin.tv/psac#/w/582944512

live coverage by the Graun: http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2010/nov/24/student-school-pupils-protests-walkout

Massive list of what's going on here: http://anticuts.com/2010/11/23/listofwalkouts24/

Also mentions of a few school walkouts happened on the main facebook page, but no reports or anything yet

There's one from the Guardian coverage.

Hundreds of teenagers poured out of Allerton Grange high school in Leeds just now to join the protest.

The well-planned action has seen almost the whole school empty with carefully prepared banners picked up from prepared stores.

The students are now marching to the nearby Roundhay high school in the hope of encouraging students there to join in. The two schools are high-achieving comprensives in a largely prosperous part of Leeds. Both regularly win Oxbridge places.

The students are chanting "they say cut back, we say fight back." Two 16-year-olds said that the focus was on the loss of the Educational Maintenance Allowance. One said: "without EMA I'll never be able to go to university. I want to follow my dream."

Also from the Guardian, police has been more than tripled in London to 800 (only 250 last time).

more updates: http://anticuts.com/2010/11/24/live-updates/

London South Bank University has gone into occupation.

http://savesouthbank.wordpress.com/2010/11/24/lsbu-students-occupy/

@paul_lewis - March broken from official route to Trafalgar Sq. Now at Embankment. This wasn't supposed to happen. #demo2010

Bournemouth march has been stopped by the police on the road next to the town hall!

A Tweet from Guardian journalist Paul Lewis:

'paul__lewis: March broken from official route to Trafalgar Sq. Now at Embankment. This wasn't supposed to happen. #demo2010'

Seems like the script has been flipped.

Guardian liveblogger claiming that UCL is under occupation as well.

'Hundreds of students' have apparently occupied the Jeremy Bentham room.

looks like a large group of Hackney school students are out: https://twitter.com/polkadotrock/status/7400130554626049

Started an image gallery at http://libcom.org/gallery/student-protests-november-24th

Quick update from Solfed people on the ground in Liverpool and London:

http://solfed.org.uk/?q=student-protests-liverpool-and-london

The London demo has been kettled near Parliament Square says The Guardian.

Paul Lewis on twitter saying first skirmishes with police are happening at Trafalgar Sq. bus shelter smashed, a few missiles thrown, now police van windows smashed, other people on twitter saying they've already been kettled.

"Occupation attempt at Cambridge involves literally storming barricades. Possibly could have chosen a more accessible target" - https://twitter.com/#!/paul_sagar/statuses/7420426867183616

And now they've abandoned the van in the street. Hope they have insurance.

Live BBC coverage.

Not too much going on in Oxford at lunchtime. A few hundred protestors gathered at Carfax. Seems quite energetic though, so we'll see what happens.

The wider, more spread action really seems to be working though.

Paul Lewis reckons lads are fighting each other in the crowd?

Latest from Brighton: Hundreds converging on Dyke Road Park, from age 12/13 up. Numbers are difficult to estimate, but could be 500-1000. Lots of energy.

Oxford University Library - Occupied! (I wondered where the crowd had got to...)

Leeds Met - Occupied!

Essex Uni - Occupied!

BBC live coverage: "You can now see one of the policemen just using a... using a truncheon there to er... to er.... calm down one of the demonstrators there." As the video feed shows the cop frantically whacking someone with his baton as a few people try to pull back a barrier.

Apparently the Swappies are set to win the award for biggest leftie arseholes of the day, in Glasgow they've allegedly been linking arms in front of the university administration offices to stop students forcing the door for an occupation.

In Brighton, the march has ended. Speeches were largely ignored, and over half the crowd has broken away on an unauthorised march. Cops are heavily outnumbered, with a total of over 2000 on the demo.

Twitter has completely blocked the #demo2010 hash tag - no updates in search results for the past two hours, and not in trending topics - http://twitter.com/#!/search?q=%23demo2010

#dayx still works though - http://twitter.com/#!/search?q=%23dayx

All kinds of shit could be going down in Brighton, Student union smashed up, clashes with police at the town hall and at least one incident of a copper beating up a kid in school uniform, according to the twitter feed (though some or all of this may be bullshit of course).

Brighton update : 500 besieging town hall, cops have put on riot helmets and have dogs. Spirits are high but there's danger of a kettle.

No idea if it's true, but messages on twitter are saying that protestors have broken out of Kettles in London and Bristol.

I'm out of juice updating the main article.

Birmingham occupation - http://birminghamstudentsagainstcuts.blogspot.com/

Can we pull together a list of all the current Occupations? There seems to be a whole load of them now.

Mike feel free to quote thgouh stuff from the Solfed article, it's got a fair bit on Liverpool and Brighton in particular now.

That might be worth it's own article - these could keep going after the protests and into next week - note if one person posts and article, anyone can edit it (although an admin will have to approve the edits).

pics of Brighton events here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/tomwills/sets/72157625458761654/

From Twitter:

Reports of mass clothes swapping inside kettle after police say kettle remains while they try to identify 'suspects'. #dayx #demo2010

Link text speaks for itself:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/universityeducation/8157187/Student-tuition-fees-protest-hero-female-peacemaker-hailed-after-confronting-violent-anarchists.html

See, this is why I think the spreading out of action, rather than just piling into London has been a strong point of the day. It'll make it very hard to paint things as being 'a few violent anarchists'.

100 still at Oxford occupying Radcliff Camera.
This is their statement:
http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2010/11/468529.html

Auto

See, this is why I think the spreading out of action, rather than just piling into London has been a strong point of the day. It'll make it very hard to paint things as being 'a few violent anarchists'.

While this is true, it's not been very hard for the BBC - they just ignored the rest of the country the whole day and focused on the same few hundred metre stretch of Whitehall. At least going by twitter people have completely seen through this. Bit too early to tell what will happen with the dailies.

mons

100 still at Oxford occupying Radcliff Camera.
This is their statement:
http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2010/11/468529.html

Brilliant. I especially like 'the library is now open to all members of the public, feel free to join us!'

Mike Harman

While this is true, it's not been very hard for the BBC - they just ignored the rest of the country the whole day and focused on the same few hundred metre stretch of Whitehall. At least going by twitter people have completely seen through this. Bit too early to tell what will happen with the dailies.

Well the guardian has changed their front page image from 'smashy-smashy van' to a large crowd with placards' so they at least may take a different tack.

EDIT: No, I tell a lie. It's back to Riot police.

Pure optimism on my part.

About 2 dozen walked out from my school. Numbers aren't huge, but this is S. Kilburn and I didn't know we had a politicized student in the bunch--and this was after the head called them in for a morning assembly and told them not to go (threat to their week EMA payment, etc.) One kid had a silly flag with a smiley face, but they all walked out in a group with their fists raised. Pretty inspiring scene, I must say. Oh there was also a pretty nifty homemade flyer being passed around that said something along the lines of you "You talk the talk, now walk the walk!"

Although no staff walked (most didn't even seem to be aware of it), the feedback was overwhelming supportive, with only the occasional "Ah, they just want a free day off". (Which, even if it true, fuck it, at least they'll be talking about this issues. That's the first step.)

Oh, and I don't know if this has been mentioned yet, but the S. London SF callout has already been picked up by the media. They are referred to as an unnamed "anarchist organization" that recommends "roaming marches" and "disrupting business".

they mentioned that and the afed statement as well as both organisations by name on sky news this morning

Latest from Brighton: There are roaming demos which have overwhelmed the police. The VodaFone shop was briefly occupied, but then occupied with some scuffles with riot cops, and objects thrown. 4-500 people are now holding one of the main roads, Western road - with only 25 cops about.

Edit: live footage here, it looks like they are more or less kettled: http://qik.com/fordie

Flash mob / occupation thingy at Lloyds TSB, London Bridge

http://www.youtube.com/watch?gl=JP&v=p5U6u8w3k14
http://universityforstrategicoptimism.wordpress.com/

Apparently "hundreds" of students took part in protests in Calderdale, the local paper mentions students from North Halifax Grammar School, Todmorden High School and Calder High School.

Michael Gove has been bleating about extremists in the crowd who are not students and that these protests should be starved of the oxygen of publicity. What a cunt.

Times Higher Education supplement trying to compile a full list of occupations - http://www.twitlonger.com/show/74u1kr

And a map of the occupations here - http://maps.google.co.uk/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&msid=109943678837866766158.000495bb3ff786461581e&z=7

Edinburgh Uni under occupation, uni staff about to lock the building, we're still figuring out how to word our demands ;)

Photos and blog up soon...

In Colchester a good few hundred FE students took to the streets in what looked like a pretty well organised display of anger and resistance. Other than a sit down outside the town hall that effetively closed the High Street for a while and a noisy march through the town centre, it seems like the demo passed without much action however.
At Essex university, it looks like a decent group of students turned out in the main square of campus... but then didn't really go anywhere off campus. There is an occupation of a lecture theatre in progress (led of course by the swappies), but some rumours are going around that the room was actually booked in advance... make what you will of that...

http://twitter.com/EdinUniAntiCuts

http://edinunianticuts.wordpress.com/

Photos coming too!

Brighton update: Things are coming to an end, with the remainder of the demo kettled, about 40 people, mostly school kids. The police are taking them out one at a time, photographing them, taking their details and letting them go. Earlier on , 400 people tried to storm the police station, but riot cops just beat them to it and repelled them.

Spoke to people in Bristol who were there:

BIG numbers at the start, 5,000+. At the top of Park St they were already singing "build a bonfire..."

March got the bottom of park st, broke a cordon. Tons of coppers, horses, they say they were unprepared but thats nonsense - the whole of Avon & Somerset police would have been powerless to stop it.

Stand off at the bottom of Park St., march stopped by a blockade of cop vans and horses. So, it starts back up the hill. Milling about, lots of 'the youth' upfront and militant, school kids seem the most militant, compared to college kids.

Fireworks thrown at horses and cop lines, classic footage on BBC of a copper walloping the crap out of his horse with his baton to stop it running away. Crowd is too mobile to get penned and whacked itself.

From 1pm to 4.30pm, a succession of 'flash occupations' of all colleges and uni buildings in the centre. Cops give up trying to defend buildings, 3 or 4 times try and set kettle traps, each time they are easily smashed. Demo now has the run of the West end of the city centre, cops cannot contain them.

"Bristol Students Uni occupied by about 200. Cops start to come in to 'take control', lock all the doors to create a 'rat run' as they called it: a single door where students would have to file thru, be photographed, arrests made.

Students see this, stay upstairs. Moments later the main demo is at the entrance, begin hammering on the doors, smash one of them, overpower the police and join with the occupation. A fire alarm goes off, again the police try and establish the 'rat run', fire exits are smashed open and everyone escapes, seemingly without arrest."

Very little sign of arrests. FIT teams cannot keep up with the roaming demo so they seem to be withdrawn.

At one point 10 vans pull up, seemingly intent on arresting a breakaway section - they run off, vans are then called away to confrontation on college green with another part of demo. Stand off on college green - protesters win easily again. Demo goes across college green and occupies City of Bristol college - by now unopposed, police reduced to directing traffic to make out they are still in control.

By 5pm, demo has dwindled to less than 100, no firm accounts but from local news sounds like there was no kettle and mass arrest at the end of it.

Hats off to the young 'uns, they showed us how its done.

Glasgow School of Art and Glasgow University are also being occupied, apparently.

Headed to Whitehall after work, the kettle seemed to be over, there were a couple of hundred stragglers left, including quite a few young kids, 15 to 17.

They were slowly being pushed up Whitehall towards Trafalgar Square by a line of riot police with riot horses in front. On one side a couple of horses charged in, batons flailing but everyone rushed at the cops, lots of small objects flying at them and they retreated. Then they went back to slowly moving everyone up. Some people were gradually dispersing, as it was very cold!

Small picket outside Hackney town Hall as well for Mayor's question time.

Heard back this morning there were a few hundred from Goldsmiths University and New Cross colleges who headed into central London about 11:30 a.m., with a fit team observing them.

Media reporting 3000 in Brighton.

Nice work with the reports everyone, do keep them coming!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/edinburgh/2010/nov/24/edinburgh-university-cuts-protest-occupation

200 poor bastards being kettled again, near Trafalgar Square.

And in a article from the BBC, "Another 16-year-old, describing himself as "Kieran from Camden", had been reading up on Marx. He gave every journalist who would listen a passable essay on the theory of class."

Arrived at Trafalgar Square before noon. Quite a few already there, the majority schoolkids from many different schools – some pretty young, year 10 or so. They said they had heard about it through Facebook. Some had walked out, others had just not gone in to school today. Very exuberant and energetic atmosphere as the crowd got bigger – a lot of focus on ‘Tory Scum’ but the cutting of EMA has now joined tuition fees as a big reason for mobilising. I gave out our leaflet which had been slightly updated. After everyone had piled up for photo ops under the Column I was talking to a member of the AF when I turned round and suddenly they had already set off. There had been no speeches, no loud speakers, no platform. I ran to keep up, then met up with Jaycee who had arrived with the contingent from SOAS.

The kettling began almost immediately. We had discussed the Solfed call-out to avoid getting trapped at Lib Dem HQ, which we agreed with, although the idea of roaming round the city causing disruption quickly proved to be a non-starter whatever you might think of it. They blocked the march off half way down Horseguard’s parade and quickly had us kettled in at both ends. I don’t know why a police van was abandoned in the middle of the crowd. The BBC and others have made play of apparent attempts by some schoolkids to stop it being trashed but the vast majority of the crowd were more than relaxed about the trashing when it started. Perhaps the police left it there as a kind of pillow to take out frustration on, and to provide lurid images for the media. Speaking of which there was more than usual interest in World Revolution from media cameras – perhaps they have read the Daily Mail and know that the ICC is the sinister force behind the entire movement. I was even interviewed very briefly by BBC Arab (I think). I have reached the stage in my life where I don’t care that much about global exposure. However it was very brief and I only got time to say that I was there to support the students who being subjected to this big attack on their futures – no time to explain the theory of decadence I’m afraid.

Being an old man I also decided that I wasn’t going to stay for the whole shindig. I managed to persuade a Nice Mr Riot Police Man that he should let me (and Jaycee as my carer) go because I had a heart condition (which is true – I have two stents to prove it) and am therefore here to write this. The mood when I left was still fairly upbeat amongst the students but obviously the aim of the kettling tactic is to wear down people’s spirits and to make a clear assertion that the state is still master of the streets. On the other hand, this experience will certainly lead a lot of people, many of whom would have been on a protest for the first time in their lives, to think about what it actually means to come up against the state. The lack of self-organisation was very apparent. I looked around for any speaker systems or loudhailers for people to start discussing collectively what to do, but saw nothing: providing the means for this to happen would have been a possible role for a radical bloc had there been one....

I agree with those who have posted to say that the spreading of the actions is the most important thing, especially now that the schools and sixth form colleges are getting involved. We had an interesting meeting of the discussion forum at our college a couple of weeks ago, involving a fair number of staff and a handful of students. I met again with a couple of the latter who decided to put out a leaflet calling people to today’s demo. I didn’t manage to link up with them today because I am only working very part time now, but I will get together with them and some other members of staff soon to discuss what next.

Stuff in Liverpool was fairly interesting, lot of school students along in uniform, presumably they came straight from school. Not sure if the timing in the article is quite right, was about 3:30pm when occupiers came down from the roof, the occupation can't have lasted more than 20 minutes or so before the cops started coming up and people left, so the march would have arrived there shortly after 3pm, not hugely important mind.

Report from Edinburgh...

At 1pm over 300 students gathered in Bristo Square, Edinburgh, to begin a day of protest in resistance to cuts and fees; meanwhile, 50 workers and benefit claimants were holding a demonstration outside Edinburgh’s A4E offices. The two marches were organised in solidarity with each other, and soon the students were marching down Lothian Road, the workers and claimants joining them, all chanting “No Ifs! No Buts! No Education Cuts!” and “Nick Clegg, shame on you! Shame on you for turning blue!”

The diverse protest marched on to the LibDem HQ by Haymarket, where the students held a sit-down study-in in the middle of the street, encouraged by passing traffic! We heard speeches from lecturers, local activists, politicians, workers, claimants and students, and then posted a copy of Nick Clegg’s pledge to oppose education cuts through the letter box — just to remind them.

The march carried on through the streets of Edinburgh, gaining support from residents and school students. At busy junctions we sat down in the road — the traffic wasn’t happy, but it made our presence known and got our message across. Heavily chaperoned by the police all the way, we paid a visit to the University’s Registry Offices, which we briefly occupied. Here we faced a stand-off with the police, who refused to allow more legitimate and peaceful protesters into the building. Eventually, deciding we had made our point, we regrouped at George Square — and then took everyone by surprise.

Still hundreds strong, we marched to a nearby lecture theatre (Appleton Tower, Lecture Theatre 2) and promptly, peacefully and effectively occupied it. We began a public meeting to discuss the future of this protest, and soon resolved to stay for the long term, until some crucial demands were met. We’re now finalising these demands for presentation to the University, getting our bedding ready for tonight, and trying to secure freedom of movement, so that more people from all walks of life can join and extend our protest.

Come on down! Solidarity!

it would be useful for those of us over the pond to know how the majority of these demos and occupations have been organized and by whom? student unions, political groups, what is the analysis of that?

the only people who'd do this shit here are anarchists, and maybe trots, and a few extra students once in awhile. we have no student unions...

Steven.

Headed to Whitehall after work, the kettle seemed to be over, there were a couple of hundred stragglers left, including quite a few young kids, 15 to 17.

The police will get a telling off for this I think(detaining children). I know the state allready does this with asylum seeking children but 'british children' have more protection than adults under the law I believe?

sabotage

it would be useful for those of us over the pond to know how the majority of these demos and occupations have been organized and by whom? student unions, political groups, what is the analysis of that?

the only people who'd do this shit here are anarchists, and maybe trots, and a few extra students once in awhile. we have no student unions...

A lot of them seem to be honestly spontanaeous, formed by ad-hoc groups. From what I've heard political groups seem to be on the fringes of the protests and definitely aren't 'in-control'. The Oxford occupation was apparently open and democratic with consensus decision making.

Look at the SWP. Their front group called for the big demo to be at 2pm at Lib Dem HQ. A lot of the crowd seem to have very autonomously decided against that course of action, without prompting.

Tommy Ascaso

Auto

Look at the SWP. Their front group called for the big demo to be at 2pm at Lib Dem HQ. A lot of the crowd seem to have very autonomously decided against that course of action, without prompting.

I'm not sure thats the case, the London Evening Standard was carrying an article that showed the agreed route the marches would take which involved going down Whitehall to reach the Lib Dem HQ. It looks like the police had intended on setting up the kettle anyway as the first cordon across the bottom of Whitehall had riot vans parked up behind it to reinforce it.

Fair enough, I stand corrected. :)

Although I still think that, while a lot of political groups would love to be in control of this kind of force, none of them are.

*Deleted - Double Post*

At Edinburgh, we've organised with our own Anti-Cuts Coalition which is mostly students, and many of them either anarchists or other lefty types. The students union supported the demo but not *so* much the occupation, we've had hot debates about whether we have solidarity with *all* protestors or just the nice peaceful ones - Students Union just like the peaceful ones and "strongly believe there should be reprisals for anyone who damages property", fortunately they're in the minority.

We're going over our demands at the moment, but consensus decision making between 70 people is slow going.

The University security guards tried to prevent any non-occupying students from accessing the building (we're in a big facility with 24 hr computers) and this made us unpopular, however we've now managed to get guaranteed access for all non-protesting students and are hoping to get freedom of movement for all of us soon.

Also, one of the students has brought her pet rats and they are WELL cute.

In Brighton anarchists and trots were variously involved flypostng etc, but there was a lot of self-organisation, students getting in touch asking for help, setting up their own facebook groups getting hundreds of attendees within hours etc. I've been in Brighton/politics for 9 years and this is the most exciting thing I've been involved in, including anti-war stuff which was similar in many ways. (this isn't heat of the moment talking, I just watched 400 kids try and storm the central police station out of raw anger with the cops, one of the most militant things I'm aware of in the UK for a long time).

Jason Cortez, if ur about, I'm curious about that school which you posted that report from a while back, what came of it?

Re: The National Union of Students. If we were in the US we'd call it them "student business unions". They are bureaucratic, unnacountable, and the majority of students in the UK are disengaged from them. This is even more evident as the members of the NUS (it comes with a university place) are given a vote in the Labour Party internal elections and the NUS itself is not much more than a staging ground for Labourite politicians. Even Americans know the name of Jack Straw. Well, he was a Trotskyite leader of the NUS, now a New Labour warmongering ballbag.

So it appears the actions, while there may have been a more active minority (at the school where I work students e-mailed around flyers), were pretty spontaneous. The other thing that was probably key was social networking and things like Twitter. Bloody kids!

That said, the university occupations seemed to be have planned somewhat in advance, with an activist group of some sort taking the lead (although the particular politics of that group, not unsurprisingly, seem to color trajectory of the occupation).

Of course, the heartening thing to take from this is all the involvement from non-politicos and their evident appetite for direct action.

Judging by the response on Facebook etc, the general attitude of a lot of the kids can pretty much be summed up as:

'Fucking brilliant, let's do it again'.

Oh, I know someone who's a staffer for the NUS. I saw him earlier in the month and asked him about the big NUS/UCU demo coming up on the 10th. He informed me they were expecting a big turnout, but was worried that 'some people are talking about occupying the street' and if this happened it would prevent them from holding more demos like this again....

Anyway, pretty indicative in my opinion about the role of the NUS: "responsible leadership" and preventing student struggle from, ya know, undertaking actions that can actually disrupt the everyday functioning of society--and win demands.

I think the NUS is screwed. They completely misjudged the general feeling of a lot of students towards Millbank and they are just not satiating the apparent desire of a lot of students for real, concrete action.

Christ, there's already 5,000 signed up on Facebook for the 'second day of action' on Tuesday the 30th.

To put that in context, it was about 3,000 an hour ago. A lot of people asking 'what next?' are being linked there.

Sheffield is occupied.

http://sheffieldoccupation.tumblr.com/

Interview with an anarchist student occupier at Sheffield University - http://thefargatespeaker.wordpress.com/2010/11/24/interview-with-an-anarchist-student-occupier-at-sheffield-university/

http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/event.php?eid=143365209046082

Also, Newcastle Uni is apparently now under occupation.

http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2010/11/468552.html

Double Post.

Seeing as I've double posted, I might as well post to an interview with an AF-member occupying Sheffield.

http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2010/11/468552.html

Fuck me! This is nuts!

This is all fucking amazing... I just wish they'd call a day of action on a weekend so that workers could join in!

This is all fucking amazing... I just wish they'd call a day of action on a weekend so that workers could join in!

Tommy Ascaso

Us workers should be joining in by leaving work! If this struggle is to develop a real revolutionary potential it needs to spread to the workplace.

I agree with that, but many workers are in isolated positions, where lone action is a massive risk. I'm just saying that a good way to help spread this newfound militancy to workers would be a weekend protest.

Though of course, you are right that it needs to spread.

Cardiff University occupation right now.

Students from Cardiff University and other institutions will remain in occupation of the Large Shandon Lecture Theatre in the university's Main Building, Park Place, Cardiff until the university management meaningfully respond to their demands.

By a consensus decision of all students in the room, the occupation puts forward the following demands:

* Free movement to and from the occupation
...* No victimisation of participants in this occupation or in previous or future actions against fees & cuts
* For Cardiff University to issue a public statement opposing any rise in fees
* For Cardiff University to issue a public statement opposing any education cuts
* Full disclosure of university finances
* Meaningful student and staff participation in budgetary and financial decisions

The occupation has received the university's Estates Manager, who refused to respond to the demands the students have put forth.

The occupation has received statements of support of Plaid Cymru and
lecturers' union the University and College Union, in addition to the following organisations:

Unison members came down to show their support earlier in the night as well, so thank-you!

sabotage

it would be useful for those of us over the pond to know how the majority of these demos and occupations have been organized and by whom? student unions, political groups, what is the analysis of that?

the only people who'd do this shit here are anarchists, and maybe trots, and a few extra students once in awhile. we have no student unions...

One more link for ya.

http://london.indymedia.org.uk/articles/6116

Statement from Goldsmiths university students.

Live feed from Cardiff - http://www.ustream.tv/channel/cardiffunioccupationlive

UCL Occupied - http://ucloccupation.wordpress.com/2010/11/24/ucl-occupation-press-notice/

thanks everyone for explaining how everything is happening. i can only imagine then that conciousness has been being raised through struggle, and somehow many of these students are learning how to start up these things autonomously from previous actions etc? it is like make twitter account, make gmail account, make blog account, invite all your friends on facebook, and occupy...a lot of trots are saying look at the UK "do this" but if we tried to do this here they'd link arms and block like i hear elsewhere, or call for outside demos, saying it is not the right moment yet...

also minus california and a few other states, we are not facing massive student austerity everywhere yet, it has more been like a slow boil...

Video message from Leeds uni occupation http://www.twitvid.com/NRAPB

Not sure if its been mentioned so far but there was a protest at Huddersfield uni including students from the colleges, local trade unionists and people from the local community

ncwob

That said, the university occupations seemed to be have planned somewhat in advance, with an activist group of some sort taking the lead (although the particular politics of that group, not unsurprisingly, seem to color trajectory of the occupation)..

See if that happened here, it'd be called adventurist! :(

London today was awash with positive energy, high spirits and A LOT of fucking anger. I was really really shocked by the amount of young kids, in uniforms, speaking Turkish, Arabic, Polish, etc. I was also surprised by their willingness to break the ongoing kettles, fight the cops and think for themselves. The only folk calling for peace are the leftists and politicos, all the kids I spoke to were absolutely chomping at the bit to confront the cops and fight for their conditions. The other thing that stuck with me was just how scared the riot cops looked. Stories were circulating about them kicking kids' heads in, saying "you'll never fucking protest again", but I can distinctly recall the facial expressions of the two lines of cops with their backs to each other, hemmed in on the pavement by Cabinet War Rooms with furious protestors on both sides.

Whoever it was who said that this has all developed too quickly for any one group to control it has hit the nail on the head.

I have never felt so encouraged in all my 8 years of political activity. What's the bet the £9,000 figure and the EMA are now "revised"?

it was me that said that. However, as to your last point, I think the government can't be seen to be caving in, and while this has been very impressive it is going to take a lot more to actually have an impact. There hasn't been serious disruption caused to the economy, and that is going to have to happen if they are going to go back on any of these measures.

The danger that the government is if they do go back on this, they will look weak, and workers will be more likely to fight them when they come for our jobs, not to mention of benefit claimants

Two things: the inaugural lecture of the University for Strategic Optimism took place this morning in a London bank branch. Check out the excellent film on Youtube here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p5U6u8w3k14.

Second, a statement of solidary from Goldsmiths students who have joined in with the SOAS occupation - a good little bit of writing on the cuts and the protests today: https://london.indymedia.org.uk/articles/6116.

Don't think there has been anything posted on what happened in Manchester so far. A friend has just published a personal account of what happened (link)

i spoke to some kids getting released from the kettle at the end of the night in Brighton, 15-16 year olds. we asked them what they thought needed to happen next, they said 'well we've got to do it again. once they'll ignore us, but keep at it and they'll have to listen'. i fucking love random 15 year-olds having a clearer strategy than pretty much the whole left combined.

also, there was an amazing moment where two trots i know with a mic and PA stood with hands on hips watching 2,000 kids blocking the road and dancing on phone boxes saying 'what the fuck do we do now?' (this was meant to be the end of the march, but there was too much energy for speeches about 'where to go next' so we just went there). and the beautiful moment of Poundland getting looted - it sits between a bank and a McDonalds. possibly the most astute communist target in the circumstances :D

Cardiff Uni have now got a blog, more will be updated tomorrow morning promise! http://cardiffoccupation.wordpress.com/

Steven.

it was me that said that. However, as to your last point, I think the government can't be seen to be caving in, and while this has been very impressive it is going to take a lot more to actually have an impact. There hasn't been serious disruption caused to the economy, and that is going to have to happen if they are going to go back on any of these measures.

The danger that the government is if they do go back on this, they will look weak, and workers will be more likely to fight them when they come for our jobs, not to mention of benefit claimants

Yeah I don't see any quick climbdown happening either. Michael Gove on BBC last night was saying he wouldn't listen to violent protest, only 'reasoned argument', protestors shouldn't get the 'oxygen of publicity'. When the interviewer asked if would he change his stance on tuition fees/EMA due to reasoned argument instead, he laughed in her face (or that might have been a few seconds later but this was the general gist).

The TUC has already staked out the 26th March demo in London. So far that's going to be the earliest of any official union activity against the cuts, except maybe some localised strikes where cuts are brought in early (is it me or is that also extremely close to the start of the new financial year). If the student movement continues throughout the next four months that'd be great, but it's equally likely that it'll be hung out to dry by itself, and things will have to start all over again (or not really start at all) with everyone else, and a much smaller number of radicalised students being involved by that point. I'd love to be wrong on this but at the moment this seems like a likely scenario.

Mike Harman

The TUC has already staked out the 26th March demo in London. So far that's going to be the earliest of any official union activity against the cuts, except maybe some localised strikes where cuts are brought in early (is it me or is that also extremely close to the start of the new financial year). If the student movement continues throughout the next four months that'd be great, but it's equally likely that it'll be hung out to dry by itself, and things will have to start all over again (or not really start at all) with everyone else, and a much smaller number of radicalised students being involved by that point. I'd love to be wrong on this but at the moment this seems like a likely scenario.

Well the TUC are moving incredibly slowly, no doubt in the hope that Labour will somehow have become relevant by March...

... but I'm heartened to see that there are a *lot* of posts on the events page saying that the TUC is being too slow and calling for action now. Even if the monolithic TUC can't be moved, I'm thinking there might be room for independent action.

http://www.occupiedoxford.org/
is the website for people occupying Radcliff Camera in Oxford. Maybe about 70 there at the moment apparently, another dozen were smuggled in in overnight.
There's a demo at 11am, and a trade-union organised demo at 5 30, both in support of the occupation.

I have heard there are still sixth formers, Brookes, Ruskin and Oxford Uni students and others in occupation.
In the education campaign and other meetings, like Auto said, there has been no leftist influence whatsoever. Some anarchists, not sure about most people.
All meetings have used consensus and jazz hands, and everybody seems to like it...
Is it right that only Oxford, Cardiff and UCL are still in occupation?

Joseph Kay

also, there was an amazing moment where two trots i know with a mic and PA stood with hands on hips watching 2,000 kids blocking the road and dancing on phone boxes saying 'what the fuck do we do now?' (this was meant to be the end of the march, but there was too much energy for speeches about 'where to go next' so we just went there).

This must also be the moment when a whole new group of students hijacked the protest :

Chief Supt Graham Bartlett appealed for anyone who witnessed criminal activity to contact them.

He said protesters who joined the planned march at Dyke Road Park and followed the agreed route caused minimal disruption and used stewards to direct protesters towards Victoria Gardens.

But protesters who were unconnected with the original march "hijacked" the protest at this point and a number of breakaway groups caused disorder, criminal damage and disruption in the city, said Mr Bartlett.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-sussex-11837275

Cops are so stupid, always the story of the violent minority that ruin it for everybody else, even a 5 year old will see through that one.

I've heard Newcasltle and Plymouth are still in Occupation at least... I think a few others may be as well.

The Oxford Occupation has just recieved a message of Solidarity from BMW workers:

"Keep up the fight, in solidarity all trade union members BMW 5/625 Branch (Cowley)"

This comes in addition to other solidarity messages from oxford community:

Ruskin UCU
Branch seretary of the CWU
Oxford City Council Unison
...Coalition of Resistance
Oxfordshire Union Health Branch
NUT National Executive member Chris Blakely & Gemma Fowler
Community and Youth Workers Union of Oxford (Unite)
Oxford Anti-Cuts Alliance
Dr John Parrington, University Lecturer in Pharmacology, Senior Tutor inMedicine, Worcester College, University of Oxford (pers. capacity)
Councillor Mike Rowley (personal capacity)

...which I think is amazing.

Second day statement from Oxford Occupation:

Further to a request from the Oxford University Proctor to meet the ‘leader’ of the occupation, the occupation has released this statement:

The Oxford Occupation has no leader. We act on the basis of consensus and, as already stated, our demands are non-negotiable. Until the university makes a public statement reiterating its opposition to cuts to education funding, and pledging not to raise fees or privastise, we will continue our occupation.

It has always been our intention to ensure the library is open to the community and we are committed to keeping the library open today. If anyone is prevented from accessing the library, we would like to make clear that this is entirely the decision of the university, in direct opposition to our expressed wishes.

We are in discussion with library staff as to how to best facilitate the continued use of the library by the public.

—

// education free for all //

After reading the line about 'We are in discussion with library staff...' I enquired as to whether the Library staff were onside. One of the occupiers responded with:

'they are onside and have been really lovely and helpful.'

Which sounds pretty positive.

no1

This must also be the moment when a whole new group of students hijacked the protes

'according to police, at this point a group of violent minority anarchist hijackers numbering about 2,000 materialised from thin air while the marchers disappeared. This hardcore minority consisting of the entire demo ruined it for everyone.' mental mental bastards.

The Guardian estimate that something like 130'00 students took part yesterday. Do people think that's realistic?

EDIT - I mean 130'000

You mean 13,000?

Liverpool was at least 3,000, Brighton was 3,000 (according to cops), London was 4,000, Manchester 1,000, Bury 1,200 which puts it at around 12,000 just for the biggest events. Including Cambridge, Oxford, Bristol etc I'd say the total's well above that even at a conservative count.

I reckon that was one of the biggest victories in terms of screwing up cop responses, multiple protests meant their best personnel were tied up dealing with relatively small numbers in London, leaving inexperienced and poorly-supported regional chiefs dealing with big and mobile crowds elsewhere. As long as that tactic keeps up and people don't fall into the trap of centralising protest on the major cities their whole approach of bringing power to a point is fucked.

Rob Ray

You mean 13,000?

No, the number quoted was 130,000. I think he just missed out the last zero. ;)

URGENT update -

40 occupiers remain in the Large Shandon Lecture Theatre. They are happy for lectures to continue but Uni management are refusing to allow this. the Uni also are refusing toilet, food and water access.

At noon the occupiers request a rally in their support, outside Main Building, Park Place. The contact for inside the occupation is 07590008249

Also if you can't make the demo please *politely, but firmly* email or phone the Vice-Chancellors office to protest the denial of human rights to students fighting for their education:

CONTACT VICE-CHANCELLOR'S PERSONAL ASSISTANT

029 20 874835 [email protected], copying in [email protected]

Rob Ray

You mean 13,000?

Liverpool was at least 3,000, Brighton was 3,000 (according to cops), London was 4,000, Manchester 1,000, Bury 1,200 which puts it at around 12,000 just for the biggest events. Including Cambridge, Oxford, Bristol etc I'd say the total's well above that even at a conservative count.

I reckon that was one of the biggest victories in terms of screwing up cop responses, multiple protests meant their best personnel were tied up dealing with relatively small numbers in London, leaving inexperienced and poorly-supported regional chiefs dealing with big and mobile crowds elsewhere. As long as that tactic keeps up and people don't fall into the trap of centralising protest on the major cities their whole approach of bringing power to a point is fucked.

My sister was at London, she said there was a good 10,000 at least.

Yeah thought it was a bit low after I pressed send, but was the last number I'd heard before knocking off work and going for drinks.

In Exeter yesterday about 300 students, mainly from the local college, gathered in the centre of the city. They were joined by a few students from the uni, and some lecturers. The atmosphere was militant and jubilant. They really felt they were making a show of their anger. After about 30 minutes there was a spontaneous surge to demonstrate down the Hight Street, which caught everyone by surprise, especially the police and those who appeared to be organising it.. Everyone marched to the Cathedral Green and then marched back again. I missed the last part of the demonstration but there was some form of meeting at the end where people could speak.

Given that Exeter is hardly the epicentre of the class struggle in Britain such a turn out and its militant feeling says something about the wider situation.

One of the slogans also spoke volumes "We want a future".

As an old lady said to everyone at the bus stop "its good to see people willing to stand up for themselves" .

Those participating were very open to anyone who wanted to join their demonstration, and were very willing to take the leaflet we were giving out. We gave out about 200 leaflets in 20 minutes.

As others have said it was the atmosphere of jubilant militancy and openess that rightly struck one. A really heart warming experience and full of promise for the future.

400 kids trying to storm Brighton cop shop, that didn't get on the news!

One thing is for certain many thousands of young people were learning first hand what capitalist freedom of expression really means: kettling and riot police.

According to the local paper, the numbers in Exeter were actually much bigger. The estimate is about 800.

Two quick reports from Solfed people in Liverpool and Manchester:

Liverpool SFer

Yesterdays protests went really well after meeting up at 12pm at the guild of students and were led off into town after around 20 minutes of waiting and the stupid SWP members trying to coral people. We then marched with various shouts “No ifs, no buts, no education cuts” etc. We arrived at town hall where a daft labour councillor tried to agree with the march and tell people labour would have done this how much they are against the cuts. A few people cheered him on which I believe was daft, we then done various sit downs and marches through the city taking over Liverpool one and bold street. We went to Hanover streets Tory HQ, where the people attempted to kettle us then we egged them and the HQ and escaped. We then got back to the guild had a sit down and then occupied a university building and the guild, we occupied the guild for a few hours until the police had to forcibly drag people out. Despite certain idiots trying to hijack the demo all went well and we need to do some more and I believe we should be organising something again soon on a weekend and occupy the universities.

Manchester SFer

A number of secondary schools in Manchester went to great lengths to stop students leaving schools to join the anti cuts demo. This is not new at the time of the anti war demos one school with a high percentage of muslin student actually locked students in breaching just about ever health and safety law and regulation. This time it seems a number of schools called in the police to prevent students leaving schools.

At one large secondary school in the south of Manchester a well organised campaign had resulted in a large proportion of students intending to walk out at of school at 12 noon in order to join the demo which started at 12.30. However when they attempted to leave by the main get they were met by staff who prevented them from leaving. Not to be deterred a number managed to "escape" by other exits. However when they got to near by bus stops they were met by "pupil support managers" and police who escorted them back to school.

I'd have put manchester as much bigger than 1000. The occupation blog is claiming 6000 and the police are claiming 2,500-3000. It was much bigger than I expected, splitting off into 3 different demos at one point to keep the police on the move after they tried to divert the route.

I'll do a proper write up of it later, but I just found out my best mate has been made redundant so I'm off to go and cheer him up first

Warwick occupation ended after no access to toilets and 'heavy handed security' - http://warwickagainstthecuts.wordpress.com/2010/11/25/statement-following-this-occupation/

Mike Harman

Warwick occupation ended after no access to toilets and 'heavy handed security' - http://warwickagainstthecuts.wordpress.com/2010/11/25/statement-following-this-occupation/

Still, they seem to be seeing it as a victory and are very enthused so good on them.

Auto

Mike Harman

Warwick occupation ended after no access to toilets and 'heavy handed security' - http://warwickagainstthecuts.wordpress.com/2010/11/25/statement-following-this-occupation/

Still, they seem to be seeing it as a victory and are very enthused so good on them.

Yes the statement is a good one, and the fact they're having a meeting at 5pm the next (same?) day is also great. There seems to be near euphoria after yesterday.

ncwob

Jason Cortez, if ur about, I'm curious about that school which you posted that report

report here

BBC Reporting that student protestors have occupied Simon Hughes' constituency office.

No article as yet.

Apparently it's 20 LSE students wot done it.

http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2010/11/468755.html

This is on twitter as well, but I don't see anything beyond that the initial announcement.

ciao,

interesting report below from kingston - which describes certain differences in 'rebellious impetus' between school and university students. question is whether the cuts in ema is a major motivation of the kids - which is basically part of a proletarian household wage and could politically be addressed as that...

------------------

About 200 school students marched through Kingston from the council offices via the FE College (where they were joined by sixth formers) to the Kingston Uni arts campus. They stood outside the campus chanting 'walk out, walk out!' but got no response from the uni students there (they said they were 'too busy working, unlike you school students who are obviously enjoying your day off'...). The school students eventually let themselves in, running around inside the building opening the doors to lectures and shouting 'walk out'. They got no response. The fire alarm was set off. So the uni students were forced to walk out but didn't join the march.

The school students then marched to a rally at the other uni campus for a few speeches, but left before the Vice Chancellor spoke, marching around Kingston blocking the roads and the roundabout - a positive response from motorists - and going to another secondary school where they chanted 'walk out!' again. The response there was much more positive than at the uni, despite teachers blocking the exits. Eventually there were about 500 students, who dispersed when the small numbers of uni students who were part of the protest decided to go to central London. Some of those school students have been told they will be suspended for walking out.

BBC says ten universities still occupying - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-11839216

Report and pictures from the University of Glasgow.
http://glasgowanarchists.wordpress.com/2010/11/25/the-view-from-garnet-hill-student-walkout-and-occupations/

Confirmed attendees on the 30th just broke the 10,000 mark.

Just got back from the Radcliffe Camera where the occupation has ended. The occupiers were gathered outside while police were checking the building. A rumour I heard said that the police had entered the building through a fire escape. I got there at 5:30 and I think it had just ended.

The occupiers seemed in good spirits if (understandably) tired. Still, there were some good chants, big cheers whenever a remaining student emerged. There were a couple of speeches, including a quite firey one from a local union leader.

People then dispersed, but there had been a call for a large student participation on Saturday's anti-cuts march and also for the day of action on Tuesday.

Two cool things from today:

1) A kid from my school ended up on the news, which was pretty cool.

2) A friend went down to the London South Bank occupation. Although he just graduated from there last year, his card was expired so he couldn't get in, which was pretty disappointing. However, there was a banner out the window which read:

"The University is our factory! Occupy and Strike!"

I like.

Like all on here I would like to welcome these developments and say that the workers I've talked to don't have the "bloody students" reflex of the 70s and 80s that the media initially tried to re-instill this time. Also a small point was the number of young girls particularly, who were interviewed who said that their parents supported them with some paying their fares or dropping them off, etc. It was good to see them taking part in the demonstration so enthusiastically and this against the particular forms of state oppression directed against this element of the working class.

There were some discussions on here recently, seemingly arguing against an organised radical block intervention, that said the situation in Britain, and of students in Britain, wasn't like France. On a militantometer you could argue that it was more significant for the working class. Whatever, it was significant. The amount of youngsters, schoolchildren on the streets demonstrating with some anger and humour, was a sight for sore eyes.

There was also a post by Jason Cortez that seemed, it was quite confusing, to be arguing against organised activity. I couldn't really see why and I think Alf's post above showed there was potential for the working class, or genuine elements of the working class to have a presence here. The government won't back down on this and students isolated do not have sufficient force to push back the state. Of course, at this stage, a proletarian radical block position or presence will not have an influence on events and no-one is saying that it will (I think that this was another argument against organisation). But the essence is that this fight will have to link up with workers' struggles. We have to see the latter develop but a minority position of the working class is still a position of the working class and the more of us involved in this - on a principle basis - the better.

The reports above are very positive.

Does anyone think it would be worth putting out a call for a united day of action on a weekend? Try to see if there are working people who will take up the action in the current atmosphere? An attempt to spread the energy and the action?

I'm not suggesting an 'Anarchist organised' event at all, but just putting a call out on the social networks and seeing what happens. I've spoken to a number of people (non-students) who admire what the students are doing and want to get involved, but can't do the weekday-centric protests. Hell, I'm one of them.

In the current atmosphere, I get the feeling any such call could be picked up and run with. Seeing as how the NCAFC seems to mostly be putting the calls out and then facilitating the free flow of information afterwards.

It's just a thought.

Does anyone think it would be worth putting out a call for a united day of action on a weekend? Try to see if there are working people who will take up the action in the current atmosphere? An attempt to spread the energy and the action?

Defo - we are few at my place of work so getting away can be tricky during the week. Am conscious also that some of the younger folk out on the streets are not long out of nappies ;) and, well, I'd kinda feel out of place!

The occupation at Manchester Metropolitan didn't stay the Monday night http://kazenokae.blogspot.com/2010/11/organise-occupy-fight-for-right-to.html

Manchester Unis been occupied since about 4 yesterday though :D

Another protest, another police medic on hand to help.

Mounted police charging protesters. MET denied it was 'charging' and said charging is a 'very specific term'.

2:39, very vicious attack with a riot shield. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W0IBvRCOBFI

Auto

Does anyone think it would be worth putting out a call for a united day of action on a weekend? Try to see if there are working people who will take up the action in the current atmosphere? An attempt to spread the energy and the action?
..

In the current atmosphere, I get the feeling any such call could be picked up and run with. Seeing as how the NCAFC seems to mostly be putting the calls out and then facilitating the free flow of information afterwards.

It's just a thought.

I think this is worth doing. Didn't have a twitter account, so I made one and posted this - http://twitter.com/#!/mikeharman2/status/8025001382903808 feel free to RT!

http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/event.php?eid=166941933346069

A call's gone out for Dec 4th. Let's see if it takes off.

Beaten to the punch.

Blargh, double post.

Old school Cambridge has been occupied - Old Schools Common Room (Next to Senate house -- first floor) - http://plixi.com/p/59275735 police surrounding the outside.

The occupation of the University of Bristol Student Union last night ended after the union met occupiers' demands (for an emergency general meeting & for access to union meeting rooms for organising.) Victory statement here

The occupation at UWE that started on Monday is still going strong. There are a bunch of workshops today & more planned over the weekend.

Bristol City College was occupied as part of events on Wednesday, after police stopped the crowd getting into the centre or back towards Bristol Uni. I heard it was held for a little while but don't know any more.

Interestingly enough, the facebook page for the 30th in Bristol says
"EVERYONE TRY TO WEAR BLACK SO WE ALL LOOK LIKE A TEAM! [...] we're all one team here.. a non violent team."

Riot if fees go up facebook event has almost 500 attendees now.

Students in Colchester were apparently kettled for hours - http://www.eadt.co.uk/news/colchester_concern_over_police_handling_of_student_protest_1_738079

Mike Harman

Riot if fees go up facebook event has almost 500 attendees now.

from that page

Solution: make Scotland/Wales pay the same as England and then nothing will have to go up.

:wall:

Solution: make Scotland/Wales pay the same as England and then nothing will have to go up.

Except of course for Scottish and Welsh students!

Tch, beat me to it!

I found this by the same bloke more offensive.

not the only solution i could go on, scroll down and read. Cut foreign aid, no benefits to people aren't working,we are able to bail out ireland,people earning more in the public sector than PM,scarp EMA (to benefit tuition fees a bit),not to mention we are in an expensive war,scottish people and welsh get much cheaper uni fees than english students not to only mention that they get free prescriptions- how is this fair?

Or maybe the Michael Jackson video, I'm not sure.

Guardian's running the police horse charge at Westminster finally - http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2010/nov/26/police-student-protests-horses-charge

Guardian's running the police horse charge at Westminster finally - http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2010/nov/26/police-student-protests-horses-charge

And the comments are really fucking angry! It is really horrible, the whole thing feels surreal to me, being too young to remember any equivalent.

Already finished but I didn't see it anywhere else - Roehampton uni was occupied too - http://roeunioccupation.wordpress.com/

Mons

These attacks by the police are not new but as old as capitalism itself. But is pretty scary stuff when you first see it. Mount police charging into tightly packed people at Wapping including old folk, was the worse I have seen personally.

Such brutal attacks on young people may intimated some but will radicalise others , May be the state is hoping to scare parents into not allowing there children to take part in such demonstrations..

This is certainly doing the image of the Coalition as really caring for the pain of the people, no good at all. The idea that a coalition with the libdems would help to renew the image of the Tories is taking a bit of a battering with young people chanting "Tory scum".

The question of spreading the struggle is certainly being posed. How do the young link up their struggle with other workers? At the demo in Exeter when one of the organisors said that this was part of the struggle of the whole working class, those present were very loud in their agreement. This is even more significant since most of those participating were 18 or under and have never really experienced wide spread class struggle.

The local Anti-Cuts Alliance is trying to bring them under their wing, through the role of young SP militants in this movement, but there is no real solid organisation to this movement for them to work with. The whole situation is rather fluid. The young are angry but what do they do next?

Matt_efc

I'd have put manchester as much bigger than 1000. The occupation blog is claiming 6000 and the police are claiming 2,500-3000. It was much bigger than I expected, splitting off into 3 different demos at one point to keep the police on the move after they tried to divert the route.

I'll do a proper write up of it later, but I just found out my best mate has been made redundant so I'm off to go and cheer him up first

I reckoned there was 3000, what you think of this report?

There is currently a figure of one hundred thousand students being involved on the 24th across the country on many websites connected in some way to this struggle. This seems way too big to me, I have no idea how the figure calculated or where it first appeared. This seems to be an attempt to grossly inflate the movement in the hope that it will encourage, others to join. At a guess I would imagine around 30,000 - 50,000 tops were involved still a very significant number. What do others think?

I'm having a lot of technical problems at present - can't log on via Google Chrome and it's very slow via Internet Explorer. I have also failed to download the pictures I snapped on my mobile on Wednesday, including a couple of the trashed police van with some slogans on it. I will try to get help from a non-technophobe, which doesn't include Jaycee, despite the generation he's in.

I am actually looking for the thread about 4 December - ie calling for actions on a day when the working stiffs can join in. It sounds like a very good idea. The question will be: what kind of actions are we going to propose?

If this isn't the place please re-route me.

Local press reports from Wednesday's protests in Bury

More than 1,200 students brought part of Bury town centre to a standstill yesterday during a protest march against education cuts and the rise in tuition fees.

The walkout, organised by the Holy Cross and Bury College Against Cuts Action Group, climaxed with a noisy demonstration outside Bury Town Hall as hundreds of students waved placards and shouted slogans...

and Calderdale

Hundreds of Calderdale students joined youngsters across the country in a mass protest.
Shouting "They say cuts, we say fight", the teenagers walked out of lessons to show their opposition to rising tuition fees and education cuts.

Around 200 students - from Year 7 to sixth form - left Calder High School in Mytholmroyd at 11am to gather on the side of New Road in Hebden Bridge.
Waving placards stating "Scrap trident, not EMA" and "Students of today are the workers of the future", they urged drivers to honk their horns as they passed.
Around a dozen police officers were on guard to oversee the protest.

At North Halifax Grammar School, Illingworth, up to 300 pupils went out at breaktime, marching through the school before sixth form students led their younger classmates in a sit-down protest in the school fields...

also Burnley, Huddersfield and Oldham

Added together the numbers on these smaller protests must be quite high.

Alf

I'm having a lot of technical problems at present - can't log on via Google Chrome and it's very slow via Internet Explorer. I have also failed to download the pictures I snapped on my mobile on Wednesday, including a couple of the trashed police van with some slogans on it. I will try to get help from a non-technophobe, which doesn't include Jaycee, despite the generation he's in.

I am actually looking for the thread about 4 December - ie calling for actions on a day when the working stiffs can join in. It sounds like a very good idea. The question will be: what kind of actions are we going to propose?

If this isn't the place please re-route me.

The 4th (or now the 5th?) is being discussed here.

Ideas for action could be around supporting student struggles on the continent. Question is where would you do that, the embassies?

Both 4th and 5th have been called by different groups.

One group called the 'Workers and Students Movement' called the 4th - http://anticuts.org.uk/ and http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_148882865159345 - and about 8 hours later (?) NCAFC called the 5th - http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=143365209046082#!/event.php?eid=172969552731286

It now looks like the two days will both be actions.

Guardian's running the police horse charge at Westminster finally - http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2010/nov/26/police-student-protests-horses-charge

There was a CIF comment on scaring the horses with lion shit. Heard this round about the time of Bloody Sunday 1972, when the cops in Whitehall came out between the horses to truncheon people,and then retreated back behind the horses. I suppose it's genetic - the fear of lions. Not sure if it would still work, since maybe the cops have genetically engineered horses not to be afraid of lion shit. Worth testing out. And for those too wimpy to sneak into the lion house at London Zoo and steal the stuff, check this out.

Here's what's happening with us South Wales lot on Tuesday:

CARNIVAL AGAINST THE CUTS
Tuesday 30 November
3 pm, Nye Bevan Statue, Queen Street (opp. Castle)

As part of the second National Day of Action and Walkouts we call on all creative resisters to Walkout of school, college or workplace at, say, 2pm to come and be part of the Carnival against the Cuts taking place on Queen Street at 3pm.

We need to crank up our pressure on the government to make sure these politicians don't smash up our education.

FEEDER MARCHES WILL BE MARCHING TO THE CARNIVAL FROM DIFFERENT CAMPUSES AND WORKPLACES -

CARDIFF UNIVERSITY MARCH - Assemble 2pm, outside the Student Union, Park Place

More marches to be announced shortly....!

CARNIVAL AGAINST THE CUTS, LIVE MUSIC, POETRY,
OTHER LIVE PERFORMANCES, ENTERTAINMENT, POLITICS, TEACH INS

Please forward this message on to as many people as possible - as soon as possible!
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Going back to Samotnaf's earlier comment... Lion shit was certainly still in the air (well, talk of it anyway) as a tactic against mounted police in the early '80s, as I remember, but it was the same old problem of getting hold of some. The other suggestion at the time was rolling industrial quantities of marbles under the horses' hooves... The trouble is (cue technophobic old gittery) marbles are probably as scarce these days as lion shit because the kids today... blah... blah... blah... computer games... blah... blah... blah... No idea how effective marbles would be anyway.

Wellclose - I said check this out on how to obtain LION SHIT.

you can get marbles on ebay

Way back when i knew people who used marble the cops would arrest them for possessing them (can't remember the actual charge) - so make sure you've got a nephew or know a young kid you can logically say you were going to give them to as a present (well, if I was a magistrate, I'd certainly believe you - and I'd charge the cops for wasting police time).

Wellclose Square

Going back to Samotnaf's earlier comment... Lion shit was certainly still in the air (well, talk of it anyway) as a tactic against mounted police in the early '80s, as I remember, but it was the same old problem of getting hold of some. The other suggestion at the time was rolling industrial quantities of marbles under the horses' hooves... The trouble is (cue technophobic old gittery) marbles are probably as scarce these days as lion shit because the kids today... blah... blah... blah... computer games... blah... blah... blah... No idea how effective marbles would be anyway.

Marbles are way more fun and it'd be like a homage to the pearl necklace scene in Home Alone.

radicalgraffiti

you can get marbles on ebay

Or, you know, toy shops.

Anyone got any idea as to the effectiveness of pepper as an anti-horse defence? The idea is to make easy pepper spray grenades with a paper bag with ground pepper in it.

I think the idea is, it doesn't actually damage the horse, unlike marbles which can potentially cause them to fall and break their legs.

This was one of the favoured methods discussed back in the '80s I remember. Marbles, pepper and caltrops. Though as I never faced a horse charge back then (all the demos I was on were both fairly peaceful and totally ineffective) I have no clue as to how useful any of them are.

I think pepper spray counts as a weapon legally and you can be charged with something just for carrying it, not sure what though.

Like Samotnaf says, lion shit is easy to come by now we have the internets.

Pepper spray counts as aweapon. I'm talking about ground pepper, that you can buy from the shop round the corner, without a credit card, and whout having it delivered. I can have some by the time you finish reading this post (I already have some, and some ground ginger which may work as well, I put them in my stir-fries).

Admitedly in my plan you'd probably have to get the paper bags from the internet.

Samotnaf

Wellclose - I said check this out on how to obtain LION SHIT.

Yes, I know. And marbles are freely available too. But in order to labour my old-gittish point about no-one playing marbles any more I had to rhetorically feign ignorance of the sheer abundance of both lion shit and marbles.