YOBS MUST BE RESISTED

The disgraceful scenes in London yesterday leave nothing but a feeling of repugnance.

To claim, as some NUS leaders seem to be doing, that the protests are justified because students have been 'disenfranchised', and that some damage is 'inevitable' is simply unsupportable. The 'franchise' is the right to vote, it is not the right to have everything as you want it and, with a coalition Government, compromise means that some manifesto promises have to be abandoned. To claim that the protesters only reacted against police actions is risible.

The animals who attacked the police, defaced and damaged important public buildings, and attacked the car carrying the Prince of Wales, can attract no sympathy whatever. These thugs were not normal protesters and, I suspect, most were not true students. Seeing some of those interviewed on television last night, it was clear that at least some were barely able to construct a sentence, let alone gain a degree.

This was not a student protest, it was near anarchy stirred up by political activists of the extreme left. It must be resisted at all cost, the ring leaders rounded up and jailed.