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Students in Bristol block cars during the protest against tuition fees and cuts yesterday. Photograph: Matt Cardy/Getty Images 9.30am:

A number of students are still occupying universities across the UK, the day after largely good-natured protests that culminated with some violent scenes in central London.

Dozens of protesters are ensconced in lecture halls at Edinburgh University, Cardiff University and University College London, while occupations are believed to be continuing elsewhere.

Some estimates placed the number of protesters nationwide yesterday at up to 130,000 students. Many were schoolchildren, including some as young as 13 and 14. While the most protests passed off without incident, there were isolated incidents of violence and skirmishes with police. Most of these were in central London, although there were also clashes in Manchester.

Yesterday the coalition government condemned the protests, saying they were being hijacked by extremist groups. The education secretary, Michael Gove, gave a notably combative response, urging the media not to give the violent minority "the oxygen of publicity", a resonant phrase associated closely with Margaret Thatcher's efforts in the 1980s to deny the IRA television coverage.

Gove said the government would not waver, adding: "I respond to arguments, I do not respond to violence."

This morning universities minister David Willetts said student protests over education cuts and higher tuition fees should not discourage people from going to university.

"My real worry is that maybe young people are put off going to university because they think that somehow we are going to be charging them fees upfront. That's not the plan," he told ITV.

No young people or their parents are going to have to reach into their back pocket to pay to go to university. They will only pay after they have graduated. I don't want any young person, therefore, to be worried about going to university, and some of these protests - they mustn't put people off.

Are you still protesting? Or indeed, still occupying a university? Please get in touch – on Twitter @adamgabbatt or email adam.gabbatt@guardian.co.uk – or share your experiences from yesterday below.

10.26am:

I've just been speaking to Jonathan Moses, part of a group of around 100 protesters who occupied the Jeremy Bentham room at University College London overnight.

The occupation began at 12.30pm yesterday - "Really, we're prepared to stay indefinitely," Moses says.

"We're protesting on two levels. One is the local level – UCL management's complicity in agitating for the reforms of the coalition government – and on a national level the call for direct action against cuts co-ordinated across universities."

Jonathan Moses, one of a group of protesters who occupied UCL overnight. To listen to this audio to the end, please turn off the auto refresh option at the top of the page

Moses says students have been "completely betrayed" by the Liberal Democrats.

10.40am:

Encouragement for the bulk of the students' action yesterday comes from smcgrath below the line, who points out that Gove's assertion as to what he will respond to does not apply to most of those on the streets yesterday:

Still in shock at Gove's pitiful response yesterday on the BBC. We should be so proud of these young people who see what is about to be taken from them and actually have the courage to do something about it.

'I respond to argument, I do not respond to violence' - GOVE
These young people are (as a majority) NOT VIOLENT. In Edinburgh they sat in the street, made speeches and then passed a letter to the LibDem HQ. That IS argument and also demonstrating their belief and passion.

Keep at it students, we need your optimism and determination to make the goverment listen and realise what they are doing is simply wrong when companies such as Vodafone have been forgiven 6 billion in taxes that they owe... Why should our young people pay?

I've just spoken to Charlotte, a third year architecture student at Oxford Brookes university, who is part of a group of around 50 students who have occupied the Radcliffe Camera at Oxford University – a circular building home to books "from the English, history, and theology collections", I'm told.

Charlotte marched from Oxford town centre yesterday afternoon before jumping a fence and entering the building at around 2pm and indulging in "a meeting and a party":

"The mood was very positive. We've been having food delivered to us. We all had a nice little huddle together to sleep.

"We want to show that education should be open to all. We'll try and stay as long as possible and get out message out to as many people as possible."

Interview with Charlotte, part of a group of students occupying a building at Oxford University. To listen to this audio to the end, please turn off the auto refresh option at the top of the page

Charlotte said the Radcliffe Camera sit-in is connected to other occupations around the country: "When the time comes for us to consider leaving we'll do so in coordination with other occupations around the country."

11.04am:

Here's a Guardian video taking in the good, the bad and the ugly from yesterday's protests in London. By John Domokos and Richard Sprenger.

I like the bit at 5:22 when a one young man pleads with the police to let him out of the enclosed area, protesting: "I've got homework to do."

Street-level view of the student protests in London. To listen to this audio to the end, please turn off the auto refresh option at the top of the page

10.52am:

11.25am:

My colleague Peter Walker has been listening to the live broadcast of the meeting of the Metropolitan Police Authority at City Hall, in central London, where the policing of yesterday's protests in the capital is being discussed. Peter reports that the Met Police has strongly defended their use of kettling yesterday.

The Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Sir Paul Stephenson, has been vigorously defending his force's actions at yesterday's London protests. Appearing before the Metropolitan Police Authority for a regular Q&A session he insisted "kettling" protesters had been the right tactic, saying: "I think our officiers did an extraordinarily good job yesterday."

Ketting, which the police called "containment", was only used "wisely, on the best of information and carefully", he said, saying it had been necessary to prevent further disorder.

Asked why it took so long to release a crowd containing so many children he answered: "Our job is to facilitate peaceful protests But we have to get the message out that when it does beyond the peaceful that it is criminal. It is quite clear that criminal acts took place."
Jenny Jones, a Green party London Assembly member, disagreed, saying she herself had been kettled for a period: "You kept people for nine-and-a-half hours," she said. "You punished innocent people."

You can watch the meeting live here.

11.38am:

In the MPA meeting (see previous post) discussion has turned to the next protest against tuition fees and cuts, which is planned for Tuesday.

The Facebook page for the event already has over 8,000 attendees, and is growing swiftly. The National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts are calling for another day of walkouts, protests and occupations in schools, colleges and universities across the country.

We can't let our campaign end with the walkouts on the 24th - we need to keep the action coming! On the 30th of November, take whatever action you can - either a walkout, a protest after co...llege, a banner drop, an occupation, a protest during school... whatever it is, take action!

[...]

In every college and every campus where action takes place, an ongoing organisation needs to be formed. A committee of mobilised students (whatever it calls itself) should meet every week (or more frequently) and democratically decide how to take the campaign forward. Where possible they should organise mass meetings in the college/uni to make decisions about the campaign. Set up a blog or a facebook group for your local and link it to anticuts.com. Try to pull off actions regularly, even if they are only small.
Every college should:
• not make cuts
• open the books – come clean about management salaries
• not waste money on consultants

Every city should have a city-wide general assembly every week that brings together representatives of all the different college anti-cuts campaigns. These city-wide assemblies should make decisions about joint actions. They should be run democratically – the chair should rotate and the meeting should not be the 'property' of any one group or faction. Everyone should respect the decisions that get made collectively.

Pretty comprehensive instructions...

11.52am:

• @chasing_dragons @adamgabbatt: Students continue to peacefully occupy the Fine Art Building at Newcastle University

12.17pm:

Interesting first-hand experience of yesterday's 'kettling' tactics from flyingshoes below the line, including the allegations regarding the police van which ended up in the middle of the kettling area.

Some protesters are alleging that the van was deliberately left by police, in the hope that some activists would damage it, perhaps undermining the overall protest.

I have just put this to the Metropolitan police. I'll post their response in the next block.

I was at this protest yesterday, and the police tatics were disgusting. We were kettled before anything even happened, essentially we weren't even allowed to protest. This was not a violent protest until we were kettled minutes into the march.

The police van was a complete set up, conveniently planted right in the middle of the street with no police anywhere near it. At two o'clock we were told we could leave in "about ten minutes to two hours", and we were still there gone 9pm. Every police officer told us a different thing, all saying we would be let out from the opposite exist they were standing at and all saying different times that were would be let out at.

On the news it said we were being given water...rubbish, I saw about 10 bottles of water being handed out at 8:30 and that was it. Kettling school children for over 8 hours in the cold is pretty low, and it seems obvious they had planned it all along. If you were kept in the cold for nearly 9 hours you might get a little bit angry too.

No one has reported on the groups of students sitting around a fire doing their homework, or the students playing guitars, dancing, singing Hey Jude and helping others who were cold. We're 16 and still weren't allowed out at 8 because according to the police man "you're probably allowed out later than 8 anyway". When we finally got out after 9 the police man had the cheek to say "Thank you for coming!"

I'm glad I was at the protest yesterday, and I'm proud to be part of a generation with some backbone.

12.27pm:

At the University of Manchester around thirty students have stayed overnight in an occupation of the Roscoe Building. They're planning a teach-in and film screenings for the next few days, I've been told in an email conversation.

Here's the latest post from then group's blog:

We're still here, after a chilly night in Roscoe Theatre B, and excited about the meeting today at 11am, please come along! At the moment we aren't allowed food or drink in, but we're hoping this will change soon.

Bring a sleeping bag!

12.46pm:

The Metropolitan police have said that their police van was left in the midst of protesters after its police officer occupants "felt vulnerable and decided the best course of action was to leave the van".

Responding to accusations that the van was left as "bait" so that protesters would damage it and undermine the protests, the Met said the van had been following protesters and became surrounded.

Full statement:

It is regrettable that students decided to damage the police van. In order to prevent this happening it would have been necessary to deploy a large number of officers and use substantial force.

Any action we take must be proportionate and in the best interests of all involved. The criminal damage to the van is disappointing, but the safety of the public must be paramount.

The van was following the crowd to determine which direction they might take. In a very short space of time, protesters surrounded the van. The officers felt vulnerable and decided the best course of action was to leave the van.

12.50pm:

Email from James Gregory, who is part of a group occupying Royal Holloway college at the University of London. He says there around 50 people stayed overnight, but will be leaving this evening:

Around 50 or 60 people stayed overnight and this kept increasing as time went on. We have a very open policy so people go off to lectures etc however there is generally a minimum of 20 in occupation. We have had some response from the university which can be seen on our wordpress http://rhacc.wordpress.com/.

We are currently constructing our response to this and will deliver it today. Our aim is to stay for over 48 hours in total so we will be leaving sometime this evening, however we are using this opportunity to open dialogue with the university and to ensure that they know that we will take more action if they do not become more active in fighting the education cuts and rejecting the new tuition fees system. In private they have told us they agree with us however they are not speaking out in public against the government which we believe would send a strong message to the government, other universities and the general public at large.

1.15pm:
Hi, this is Haroon Siddique here taking over the blog for a while.

Students at Soas occupied one of the university's main buildings on Monday and remain in place. Students from another London University, Goldsmiths College, have released a statment of solidarity with Soas:

The occupation in SOAS is one of many acts by all of those who are going to be negatively affected by the cuts we are to be shackled with. The actions the government wish to effect are a few weeks away, we will remain committed to expressing our views concerning the *right* to a non-elitist, non-corporate education system before and beyond (if necessary) the coming 'act'. We reiterate our absolute solidarity with those who have been subject to confinement-without-release within the arms of the law, for the best part of a freezing day. The expression of opposition to government should not be pre-figured as a criminal act. The police took up what is known as a 'Kettle' formation within an hour of the arrival of the protestors- thousands (yes, thousands) of whom are high school children. While the physical presence and movement of the protestors is part of the expression of their opinion, the physical presence of the police and their deeply intimidating formation marks their antipathy to such expression.

1.27pm:
London blogger Adam Bienkov tweeted that the Met Commissioner said during the press conference that he had "no record" of police officers on horseback charging at protesters during yesterday's demonstrations.

But here's an account received by email from Dylan, who says that he was at Downing Street yesterday at around 6pm among the protesters:

Police in riot helmets were gradually pushing us back on foot, but when that proved ineffectual, they brought forward a line of horses. Assuming the horses were just there for show, we continued protesting. Then the horses charged. This sounds like a complete exaggeration but there's no other word for it. The horses charged forward at a canter, through the crowd. I pulled my friend out of the way just in time, but I saw a girl, around sixteen or seventeen, get trampled. I didn't see her get up. Another man was trampled and immediately helped up by other protesters.

Dylan adds:

Earlier I had also noticed an incident in which a police officer was clearly out of control. A girl at the front of the crowd, nearest the police, was yelling, "Peaceful protest, peaceful protest!". He screamed "FUCK OFF!" and punched her in the face. It's interesting how, despite the presence of reporters at the scene, none of this has been in the news.

1.52pm:
Last ditch talks are currently being held to try to reach a deal between Soas management and students before a scheduled hearing at the Royal Courst of Justice. The students, who occupied the Brunei Gallery Suite on Monday, were served with an injunction and application for a possession order yesterday.

The case is due to reconvene at the Royal Courts of Justice at 2pm. But Jonathan Evershed, a 21-year-old who is part of the occupation, told me that the management has just agreed to talks with a student delegation at the court before the case to see if a deal can be reached, having previously refused to any direct dialogue. He believes this is an indication that the students are "in a very strong position". He said:

What we are pushing for, and what we are not prepared to compromise on, is we want the management of Soas to come out and actively condemn the government's stance on higher education.

2.04pm:
Another interesting firsthand account of yesterday from below the line:

MontagueWithnail

25 November 2010 1:11PM

I thought the Police handling of the day was pretty woeful, after 2 o'clock it was clear that everyone just wanted to get warm and have something to eat, but most of us weren't let out until 9.30. They claimed to the press that they were providing toilet facilities and water, there were 2 toilets between 3-5000 people and about 20 bottles of water that went within 20 minutes. There were lots of people there who had clearly just been caught up in the demonstration, i met a couple of American tourists who were had to catch a flight home at 8.30 and they were sure they were going to miss it. I bumped into a guy from my home town who is an electrician and had just got caught up in it, he was meant to be starting work at 5 and only got out at 9.30 with me. The Police were operating a policy of 'if you're not wearing a suit you're a protester'.

I think the biggest travesty of the whole day was that 50% of the people they contained were under 16. At around 7 they started letting women and children out, I asked the Police Officer 'why not men?', he responded 'well, we saw some males smashing the van, therefore we are keeping every male here as a suspect, irrespective whether you did or didn't do it'. I think that pretty much sums up the whole day.

2.24pm:
Rosalie Allain has sent an account by email in which she says police took the details of innocent protesters before allowing them to leave:

Yesterday my friends were finally able to leave the Central London kettle at 9.20pm. They and others were allowed out 5 at a time, and in order to get out, had to walk between a sort of police tunnel, walking between two police vans, and a police officer. The police would then stop certain individuals and photograph them, some front and rear, and then take their details (address etc). And then they would be allowed to leave. These individuals were completely innocent (if the police had anything against them they would have arrested them). Two of the people I know who were photographed and had their details taken are student activists and regular protesters and must have fit the "'violent extremist" myth because they were carrying megaphones. Anyway to me this is sickening and a breach of civil liberties.

3.05pm:

The Metropolitan police have stood by the Metrpolitan police commissioner, Sir Paul Stephenson's assertion that he had "no record" of police officers on horseback charging at protesters.

A spokesman said: "Police horses were involved in the operation, but that did not involve charging the crowd."

He added: "I dare say they were doing the movements the horses do to help control the crowd for everyone's benefit, which has been a recognised tactic for many, many year, but no, police officers charging the crowd – we would say 'no they did not charging the crowd."

The spokesman did also add that charging is a "quite specific term".

3.36pm:
Hi, this is Haroon taking over from Adam, who has gone home for the day.
The BBC is reporting that student protesters have occupied Simon Hughes's constituency office. The BBC's chief political correspondent, Laura Kuenssberg, tweeted:

Simon Hughes' constiuency [sic] office is being occupied by students in protest over tuition fees

Hughes, the Lib Dem deputy leader, is on the left of the party but said yesterday that he had not yet decided how to vote on the proposed rise in tuition fees.

3.50pm:
An update from the court hearing where the university management of Soas are trying to get a court order to remove students from the Brunei Gallery Suite they have been occupying since Monday (see 1.52pm).
Apparently the management representatives did not show up for agreed talks before the hearing, which were supposed to be an attempt to resolve the stand-off without recourse to the legal system.
A student at the Royal Court of Justices told me the university management are basing their case on a health and safety provision in their lease of the Brunei Gallery Suite which states that people should sleep overnight in the building.
The students' barrister is seeking an adjournment to give them more time to prepare their case.
The student who contacted guardian.co.uk told me that given the reason for the occupation, the management were "contradicting the aims and objectives of the college itself, [which are] securing the welfare of the students and future learning".

3.57pm:
More information on the occupation of the Lib Dem deputy leader's constituency office.
The sit-in was organised by unions from LSE and the University of the Arts, London. Also taking part are students from London South Bank University and Southwark - Save Our Services (Simon Hughes represents Southwark and Bermondsey).

Ashok Kumar, education officer of the LSE student union, said:

We will not leave until Simon Hughes keeps his election promise to unequivocally vote against any increase in fees, as well as reinstate the EMA (education maintenance allowance). Many people campaigned for Lib Dems because of their pledge, but when the democratic process has completely failed us, occupations, road blockages, strikes and other forms of non-violent direct action are our only recourse. If this vote goes through an entire generation of young people will know nothing but hatred for the Lib Dems, a party that will undoubtedly return to its long history of political irrelevance in the next election.

4.13pm:
One occupation that ended today was at Warwick.

The students issued the following statement:

We decided to end this occupation; not because students didn't want to join us or because we didn't want to stay, but because it had become physically impossible for us to create the space of free education that we had envisioned. We know that many students and lecturers tried to join us but were blocked from doing so by the University authorities and police. We want to create a space on campus for free and democratic education, for people not for profit. We have not been able to do that in this room.
We see this occupation as a great success: the amount of solidarity and support from students, staff, lecturers and others at Warwick and beyond has been incredible, and the considerable media coverage has successfully carried our message.
We therefore leave here on our own terms, with the knowledge that this is just the beginning. We see a real momentum building and our demands to the Vice Chancellor and University authorities are still outstanding.

4.29pm:
An occupation of Newcastle University is ongoing. They entered the Fine Art building at 5.30pm last night.

They're inviting people to join them for traditional student pastimes tonight - pizza, music, films and sleep!

On a more serious note, their demands include:

That the University release all documents regarding education cuts at this establishment to students and lecturers.

That the University release an official statement rejecting the Government proposals for Higher Education, condemning any education cuts or rises in university tuition fees and acknowledging the current breakdown of democracy that has lead to these student protests.

4.44pm:
We're going to wrap up the blog now for today. Thank you for all your comments and emails and sorry we couldn't use - or reply to - them all.
To all those still occupying university/college buildings, stay safe and warm. Goodnight.

View the original article here