Students disrupt Edinburgh University graduation to demand university, 'pay your workers’
Not included in Edinburgh University’s graduation ceremony highlights this year is the series of student protests carried out throughout the week in solidarity with striking university staff.
Last night, during the formal proceedings of the Edinburgh College of Art graduation, attendee students presenting a unified show of solidarity with their lecturers as they disrupted talks by a university official with the chant, ‘pay your workers’.
The chanting and clapping spread around the room, until the speaker shushed the students and urged them to ‘settle down’. He told the protestors to, “please just remember that this is a special day for a lot of people, well just let me go into my speech and I’d be grateful if you could just be respectful of everything and everybody here today.”
He was met with some claps however this was quickly followed by boos as one student shouted, ‘if not now, when’, which received loud cheers and applause.
Students were expressing their support for university staff and members of the UCU union engaged in ongoing industrial action over pay and conditions.
The university’s response did not go down well, with one ‘proud’ Edinburgh graduate stating how they were not impressed.
Rosie Baruah wrote: “The “settle down” to a group of graduates who have not had their final assessments marked, followed by an admonishment implying they were embarrassing the university in front of distinguished guests… As a proud Edinburgh Uni graduate I’m not impressed by this response.”
Staff Student Solidarity Network Edinburgh have been documenting the protests at the university’s graduation ceremonies which started on Monday, 3, July until Friday, 14 July. With students taking bans and placards on stage as they collected their degree scroll as well as large protests outside the building.
University staff have been taking part in a marking boycott at 145 UK institutions which began on 20 April, and is set to continue as long as the dispute over pay and conditions goes on.
More than half a million graduations are expected to be affected this summer by the boycott, with the effects varying across universities. At the University of Edinburgh, up to 2,000 students were set to graduate without knowing their final mark.
Students at Edinburgh University had been planning a peaceful protest at their graduation in response to their result delays, as one student told the BBC that it was an ‘opportunity for students’ voices to be heard’.
The university recently came under further fire when it was revealed the vice-chancellor chose to travel in luxury and had spent just shy of £13,000 on business class flights last year. The university responded by saying that he was working as a ‘worldwide’ representative.
Watch the video below:
(Photo credit: Staff Student Solidarity Network Edinburgh / Twitter)
Hannah Davenport is trade union reporter at Left Foot Forward
Left Foot Forward’s trade union reporting is supported by the Barry Amiel and Norman Melburn Trust
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