Viewpoint – Independence: Don’t Let the Budget Cuts Bite – 2011 London Student Fees Protest
Tamara at the protest.
18-year-old, Tamara London was one of nearly 50,000 people who attended the boisterous march past the Houses of Parliament.
A gap year student from Barnet in north London she expressed her concern at the government’s planned raise of tuition fees: “They should be encouraging people to go into education, instead they are putting people off university. It’s unfair.” She shouted against the backdrop of the roaring crowd.“They should be putting more money into our education and future”.
The proposed increase in fees will not be implemented until 2012. Tamara is especially anxious for her friends, who, being a year younger, will have to pay up to triple the amount she will. “It’s unfair that because I’m a year older they won’t have the same chances.”
She is hoping to begin a degree at University College London in September 2011, a year before the proposed cuts. It may be a very tough year to apply for university, with applications set to rocket after the announced tuition fee raise – as well as competing with the record number of unsuccessful applicants that will be re-applying after last year.
