I'm in my last year of school, I've applied for universities. I'm working myself half to death, along with the rest of my friends, at one of two very competetive grammar schools (a girls and a boys school). We are struggling over coursework, learning equations, writing practise essays, revising for resits, drawing the nervous system, learning lines. Some of us are going to interview skills days, we're on open days, checking emails compulsively, not sleeping, frustrated, jumpy nervous wrecks. We're average A level students. And now we find out that it could all be in vain.
"What are you so worried about?" I hear you cry. "You're applying this year, the fees won't effect you!" Tell that to the friend of mine who wanted to get work experience before applying to Veterinary Medicine, whose deadline was gone before the rises were announced. Who faces a six year laboratory course at a cost of £9000 per year, plus accomodation, clothes, food, bills, a social life etc. etc. etc. She'll graduate in 2017 with debts of over £50,000 and aged just 25.
Yes, we're applying this year, and so are a high percentage of students who would otherwise have deferred, or applied as a year 14. Competition is up. The government has slashed education budgets. Places are down. We can't all go this year, some of us will pay. And pay and pay and pay.
The students have been rallying against these rises for weeks now. We aren't all uni students, we aren't even all sixth formers. There have been 13, 14, 15 year olds penned in by police for hours at a time, in freezing weather because they wanted to make their voices heard. That's not democracy.
There are students now who won't go to university. I go to a grammar school. It's a non-fee paying school. We aren't the poorest, but they get fee concessions because the government can't be seen to cut out the worst off. We aren't wealthy enough to be funded through Eton and then Oxford , Mr Cameron. We are intelligent, we are hard workers and we want to learn more to benefit our society. We could have been your future doctors, teachers, politicians. We'll fuel your economy, run your businesses, defend your case in court. We'll take care of your teeth, we'll take care of your pets, we'll write for the newspapers you read and produce the television you watch. Or we would have done. Now many of us won't. Is this your fair society, Mr Cameron?
We are being ignored. Many of us are not yet voters. We don't yet count. Now, the vote at 16 is another matter entirely, but in this case it could have changed how you treated us. Would you have treated the people that elected you so badly? Nick Clegg, you made a promise that we would have a future. You broke that promise and the teenagers and students of England feel betrayed. It's so easy for you to tell us that we don't understand, that cuts have to be made, that students are selfish, lazy scroungers who want nothing more than another few years of long lie-ins and drunken nights out before we have to face the responsibility of work. I think the protests against this prove that the teenagers of England are by far the most politically active citizens in the country.
It doesn't end here either. Because of the way you voted today, I may never own my own home, like my parents and grandparents do, because my level of debt will mean I can't get a mortgage. I will most likely still be paying back my debts when I have children of my own and they will suffer too. I was fortunate to be bought up in a relatively financially-stable home, to go to drama club and ballet, to learn musical instruments and how to swim. Will my children have that?
Mr Cameron, Mr Clegg and the others who voted for this, you have destroyed dreams today. My generation weren't responsible for the credit crunch, we weren't gambling in the banks or borrowing from other countries, and we'll suffer. You had your higher education and it was free. Some of it was probably even grant maintained. Yes, university is not a right, but it's an aspiration and you destroyed that. To the ones that voted against, thank you. Thank you for standing up for your beliefs and against the pressure of your leaders. For those who abstained, your vote 'No' could have changed lives today.
So yes, we are angry and yes it is justified. You have proved yourselves devoid of pity and the country as well as individuals will suffer. When I turn eighteen you can be sure not to get my vote.
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