2012’s freshers can be forgiven for not having noticed the Trades Union Congress (TUC) march on Saturday. Though the march brought 150,000 people out on to the streets of London and Ed Miliband to the podium in Hyde Park, a combination of drizzle, lack of CUSU promotion and the reality of higher student fees combined to ensure that Cambridge student participation was low.

The march for ‘A Future That Works’ focused on employment for younger people as part of a broad anti-austerity message, though student turnout was limited. The National Union of Students endorsed the protest, reposting a TUC statement: “If the government keeps on with big spending cuts and austerity, we face a lost decade. Even on their own terms, government policies are failing. To close the deficit we need a healthy growing economy that generates tax income. But austerity has led to a vicious circle of decline.”

The protest numbers were significantly smaller than the last Trades Union Congress march in March 2011, where 500,000 protesters took to the streets with a similar theme of a ‘March for the Alternative’. Organisers claimed a turnout of 150,000 marchers, while police put the number at closer to 100,000. Smaller demonstrations were held simultaneously in Glasgow and Belfast.

The protest was largely peaceful, although there were reports of protesters dressed in black being pursued by police down Oxford Street, as well as activists from Disabled People Against Cuts blocking Park Lane by chaining their wheelchairs together, forcing police to reroute traffic.

The march passed the Houses of Parliament and Trafalgar Square before reaching Hyde Park, where Ed Miliband addressed the crowd. The Labour leader claimed that Labour stands for “all the young people in this country who want work but can’t find it in Britain today”, though he was booed when he said that some spending cuts were inevitable under any government.

The TUC General Secretary, Brendan Barber, also spoke to the crowd, arguing that Britain had to make a choice “between a future of lengthy dole queues and millions stuck in dead-end poverty jobs, or decent work with opportunities for our young people. Between a future of economic stagnation and despair, or a future of hope and real recovery. Our choice is clear – today, we demand a future that works."

CUSU voted in a Council meeting not to fund any coaches to take students to the rally, and is likely to spend more time promoting the National Union of Students ’Demo2012’ rally on the 21st of November, which will concentrate on education, under the slogan ‘Educate, Employ, Empower’.

Protesters are aiming to recapture the numbers seen in 2010, when CUSU organised a series of local protests in Cambridge against higher student fees, while the National Union of Students organised marches in London in which around 50,000 students marched – though the protests were overshadowed by the occupation of Conservative Party headquarters and Charlie Gilmour swinging on the Cenotaph.

However, in the absence of issues that seem directly relevant to Cambridge students, it may be hard to muster enthusiasm. A third year Pembroke student who participated in the successful student protest against proposed cuts to Cambridge bursaries said that “two years ago there were the student tuition fee rises and the threat to student bursaries. Now I can’t see that there’s anything directly relevant to Cambridge and I wouldn’t go unless it was for something that affected the university”. 

The smaller numbers of Saturday’s march and the lack of student participation may well point to a feeling that the battle has already been lost since the coalition government has pressed ahead with austerity measures in the face of public demonstrations, especially for first year students who are already paying £9000 tuition fees.