One of the most striking things in the last month’s direct action against tuitions fees has been the age of protestors. On last Tuesday’s march through York, sixth-formers far outweighed university students in their attendance. The march was purposely organised at 4pm in order to allow younger students to turn up without missing classes. At the London 10.11.10 march, thousands of sixth-formers showed up in unprecedented numbers.
These facts alone should be enough to quell any argument of disaffected youth or uneducated kids. These sixth-formers do care about education investment and that they are going to enter underfunded universities in the next few years. They are clearly aware of the deep significance of their direct action, and they are not backing down.
Speaking to protestors last week at a march through York, it became clear that this was their only way of getting their voices heard. Should an election be called as a result of the NUS’s demands to instigate the right to recall MPs, these students who have done the groundwork in terms of protest would be unable to make their point known officially. And we’re not just talking about the students storming the Millbank building or smashing up police vehicles – it would also be those schoolgirls who encircled a police van to prevent it being smashed up, those students who stood in the way of violent protestors in order to protect the name of education nationwide.
Of course this demand from 16 and 17 year olds to get their voice heard doesn’t just stop at the education sector. At the age of 16 the rights of teenagers jump through the roof. They can join the armed forces, leave school and scale the employment ladder, leave home, get married (with consent), consent to medical treatment, consent to sexual intercourse and serve fuller prison sentences. They can even enter the X Factor. Importantly, they can join a trade union or political party, meaning they can vote on the leadership of a political party – just not the leadership of the country.
If it wasn’t for these rights, perhaps I wouldn’t be arguing for the voting age to be raised, but the truth of the matter is that they are making their voices heard, they are apparently ready to face the ‘real world’ – so why can’t they decide how that world is run?