uni protest 14 sept 2011
[Music] your pass stand you know hold your head What's the de can you explain to us what's Happening Here What's Happening Here uh we we just occupied the University our demands stop the vice Chancellor's attack on uh the academic staff no fear Rises this year stop voluntary student mhip democratize University governance and University student alls as you can see the police here have responded with [ __ ] uh 100% aggression and uh attack the university this is an attack on the University this is an attack on students OCC the unity police have occupied the University he what's your name stay down uh this was just a collection of students that came together to talk about sustain ideological tax on education in this country and uh things sort of progress to the along the lines there was a a little bit of um intimidation from the security guards so we decided we wanted a peaceful place to talk through some of these ideas and uh as the aggression from the status quo grew we we uh barricaded the doors and and continued the conversation you must have been aware there was going to be a confrontation though because we I mean that was never an intention the idea was to to have a conversation about the the particular things that are going on within the university and within education in New Zealand and we have a right to be here yeah and we have a right to be here we this is our University this is our University and and you know a lot of us pay a lot of money to be here it's supposedly an open space for open ideas where we able to share our creative ideas about what the university should be the Democratic process with within this this University and other universities in this country under sustained attack we take that up onto the foot that great cheers thank you well this was this this was part of a nationwide day of action so there were a few things um one there's there's an ongoing struggle within this particular University with the the teachers education Union um Stuart McCutchen is trying to remove some of the um more democratic process that go into uh the sort of job construction essentially he's trying to um change the the conditions that they already have um so moving things out of contract and into policy so that he has some sort of dictatorial control um you know it's it's it's part of a long process of watering down the the quality of Education in this country and and we think it's about time that someone some people stops to talk about that so this was a place to come together and talk about that yeah yeah I heard talk about student rights are on the tech yeah how committed are you to to occupying the university well we we're going to see and we we'll see if uh if the students come back together I you know we already know that news of what we've done here tonight has circulated to other parts of the country and other students around the world are talking about it well this is something that's happening all over the world students are are coming together and taking back Democratic power that they have that's theirs thank you very much what do we want student rights when do we want it what do we want student right when do we want it you're under attack stand up fight back student rights are under attack stand up F back student rights are under attack stand up fight back stand up fight back stand up we freedom is under attack stand [Applause] up [Applause] you want to give a statement what happened here tonight um well what happened was um I've got your wallet thank you um what happened was we um we're trying to tell the VC we have a conversation with the VC didn't take it too well um the university is ours and we are claiming it and um just thought you should know you want to give a statement uh we're out here in front of the centr city police station uh about an hour ago we just left the University where we had occupied the library basement demanding um of course free education a universal student allowance um greater student union rights um and also um for the government to completely scrap the voluntary student unionship the police arrested um as far as aware uh one girl harer outside and two other dudes outside um the library based who are supporting us they also then when we were all coming out at the very end they picked off some random guy and they arrested him and now they think that's all right they have no reason to we were democratically protesting so we out here demanding freedom for the rest of the people who are R now holler one of the risk has already been released but still the others have to be released and that's why we're out here demanding their released immedi get arrested for something you know and I agree with get busted for thought for you will be arrested for your thoughts we're prosecuted because we're different you know because we weren't bow to the status quo and because you know we [ __ ] shouldn't have to we live in a country with a democracy and we can't even stay in a building past 9:00 p. because they tell us we can't we pay our fees we go to these universities to learn and if we want to learn we need to stay there until we finished [ __ ] learning not when they say so and not when they lock the door on [Applause] [Applause] us okay now the police have warned us that this loud Halo is too bloody loud because we're trying to address our Us in this corrupt system on how corrupt this whole system is and how much we have come here to show our support for our brother who got locked up for absolutely nothing for fighting for his rights as students for fighting for us rights as a human being so the police have given us 10 minutes to shut this loud ha out because these rich Fells in these hotels are probably mining because us freedom fighters protect the gates Jo are here let us all be free the police the police said that um they're going to release him because he didn't he did nothing wrong on the on the conditions that we walk away and they'll let them go walk away when they let them go when they come out then we will all walk relas [Music] the nowy we just hang out here for another hour then back to the university [Music] he just explained that um if we leave he'll he'll get released both of them um if we stick around uh they won't release them and and and and the police uh he said that they'll be happy to stand here because they're getting paid um and they're taking our taxpayers money to stand here um to to protect this corrupt system he's didn't giving me the note yeah he knows ho ho hey ho Johnson gota go