On Wednesday this week over 1,500 AIT students marched from the main campus on the Dublin Road to the Civic Square in the middle of town, with a stop off at the offices of Mary O’Rourke, TD, to protest against the introduction of third-level fees as a result of the Budget.
The cries of “No cutbacks! No fees! No Fianna Fáil TDs” and “No to fees! No to fees!” resonated around Sean Costello Street and travelled up towards St Mary’s Place as the students marched to the offices of Mary O’Rourke to lay a wreath of flowers at the door to mark ‘the death of free fees’. From here, they marched down into Irishtown and up into Church Street as they made their way to the Civic Square.
President of the AIT Students’ Union, Micheal Fogarty, was the first speaker of the day. He described the fees as “a bloody joke” and said the protest represented “the spirit of AIT”. As he ended his speech, he received raucous applause from the crowd when he said “I know what we want, you know what we want, this is what we want! No more fees!”. But the biggest cheer came from his last statement, “We will keep this up until the problem is finally solved!”.
After him, former mayor and Sinn Féin councillor Paul Hogan got up to speak, saying, “As a registered student at NUI Maynooth, I can speak from the heart on this issue, knowing the financial stress and strain that accompanies third level education in this state”. He said that the fees “put the final nail in the coffin of free education”, and challenged the Government’s logic. “The Government tells us, students, that we are the future of the country...why then are the students of Ireland treated with such blind contempt?”.
Cllr Hogan also attacked the Green Party for their u-turn on fees. “In the Greens’ election manifesto in 2007, they announced that they would not be in favour of introducing fees, yet here they are, advocating Minister O’Keefe’s introduction of them,” he said, before exploding with: “It is clear that this Government has failed us, and it is time we told them we have had enough. The reversal of the cutbacks and proper support for students is the way forward.”
Fine Gael councillor John Dolan followed by attacking the Government’s education cuts in a number of areas, saying they were “nothing short of a disgrace”. “We’re always being told that education is the future. Yet how can this be when education is so expensive? Even before the budget the bills for second level put a dent in the table...You students must fight for your rights, and I will support you in any way I can.”
Also addressing the crowd was former AIT student and Labour Party member, Morgan Fagg. “€600 is a lot of money. It is not just a fee; it doesn’t pay for accommodation, transport, books, or materials,” he said. “Education is a right, not a privilege. It’s for all students, not just the ones with money in their pockets.” He ended his speech saying, “We’re going to harass every politician in this land until the problem is solved,” before being heckled by a passer-by who was booed down by the students and taken away by a garda.
