Thousands of Danish Students March Against Allowance Cuts

Photo: Ritzau Scanpix/Ida Marie Odgaard via Reuters

Thousands of Danish students marched through Copenhagen on Wednesday against government plans to cut student allowances, joining a growing wave of youth protests across Europe. Organisers said up to 13,000 young people joined the march, while around 40,000 students went on strike at 57 schools across Denmark.

The march began at Copenhagen City Hall Square and ended at parliament, under the banner "Enough is Enough". Students chanted "Broken Promises" and carried signs reading "Save SU", "Less Support, Less Educated" and "Don't Cheat the Young". SU is the Danish name for the student allowance, a payment every student over 18 has received since 1970, no matter what their parents earn.

That long standing rule is what the government now wants to change. Under a draft budget bill, students who live with their parents would lose the allowance completely if their parents together earn more than 700,000 Danish kroner a year, about 105,000 dollars. Students whose parents earn between about 420,000 and 700,000 kroner would get a smaller, sliding payment instead.

The sums involved are small by Danish standards, but they matter to students. Those living with their parents now get 1,154 kroner a month, about 173 dollars, while students living on their own get 7,426 kroner, about 1,111 dollars. Al Jazeera reports that the Higher Education Ministry expects around 14,000 students to lose their grant altogether and about 8,000 more to see it cut.

The government says the money saved will help pay for higher defence spending. It has also proposed that new graduates should only get unemployment benefits if they worked during 18 of the last 24 months of their studies. Industry Minister Martin Lidegaard, who leads the Social Liberal Party, admitted the cuts "are not pleasant decisions".

The students see it very differently. Danish High School Students Association president Oscar Tonsberg Hoffmann told the AFP news agency it would be wrong to dismantle "one of the world's strongest educational systems". Kieran Hindshaw, a 23 year old agronomy student, said he felt betrayed by a government that includes left wing parties, yet was cutting welfare for young people while funding corporate tax cuts and warfare.

Denmark is not alone in this. Student protests that started in France have spread across Europe in recent weeks, and the anger has widened from education cuts to the cost of living and housing. Young people are also at the centre of big policy fights elsewhere, from Australia's court case over its under 16 social media ban to wage protests by young garment workers in Bangladesh, and from political upheaval in Spain to record voter turnout in South Africa's local elections.

What this means in plain terms: Denmark's student grant has been a promise that anyone can study, rich or poor, for more than 50 years. The government wants to means test it to fund defence. The students who marched on Wednesday are saying that breaking that promise will shut poorer young people out of education.

Sources

• Al Jazeera: Danish students join European protest wave against education funding cuts
• Arab News (AP): Danish students join European protests against education cuts
• The Citizen (AFP): Danish students join European protests against education cuts

The next test is whether the government changes the draft budget bill before parliament votes on it, or holds firm and faces more student strikes.

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