52,000 people

An estimated 52,000 people, according to the National Union of Students, marched through central London to display their anger over government plans to

• increase tuition fees while cutting state funding for university teaching.

Tens of thousands of students took to the streets of London in a demonstration that spiralled out of control when a fringe group of protesters hurled missiles at police and occupied the building housing Conservative party headquarters.
Ministers and protesters acknowledged that the demonstration – by far the largest and most dramatic yet in response to the government's austerity measures – was "just the beginning" of public anger over cuts. Police, meanwhile, were criticised for failing to anticipate the scale of the disorder.