On Saturday the 29th January, I decided to attend the TUC & NUS event: ‘A Future That Works: National Rally for Young People‘. As both a student and a public-sector worker, I’m deeply concerned about the increase in tuition fees, as well as the impact the austerity agenda is having on Britain’s public services and local government.

The day began at 11:00am, with an initial march from Manchester University to Platt Fields Park in Rusholme. Unfortunately I didn’t arrive into the city until midday, so I made my own way on foot up to the park, where the rally was about to begin.

Speakers appeared from the GMB, the FBU, Unison, the youth council, and a wide variety of other organisations, as well as Manchester Central MP Tony Lloyd. A representative from the NUS was booed off stage early on, and NUS president Aaron Porter abandoned his appearance due to some earlier harassment during the march, but the crowd was overwhelmingly positive to the remaining speakers.

As the first major austerity demonstration in Manchester, I personally thought the rally went very well indeed. It was peaceful, and the atmosphere was certainly relaxed and overwhelmingly calm. However, as the rally came to a close just after 2pm, the protest again took to the streets, and things got a little more chaotic.

The vast majority of the protesters made their way along Wilmslow Road towards Manchester University. As we walk through Rusholme’s famous curry mile the pace is frantic, and traffic grinds to a halt as protesters, police vans and horses swarm all over the roads. For me, the adrenaline is beginning to kick in. At times I find myself struggling to catch up, and at several points have to run to keep pace whilst attempting to simultaneously take photos and send updates via Twitter.

After marching for around ten minutes, the police become involved for the first time. Two police horses and a rapid response van suddenly pull alongside the demonstration and drag a protester away, whilst other protesters attempt to stop them. I quickly take some photos, then continue running along Wilmslow Road to catch up with the larger group.

As we walk past the Whitworth Art Gallery, a group of protesters approaches Barclays bank, and the march grinds to a halt. Suddenly – without any warning – we’re surrounded on all sides by around a hundred officers. In a flash, three hundred of us find ourselves trapped inside a police containment area (otherwise known as a kettle), similar to the kind used in the London student protests. A few protesters make a break for it, attempting to escape before they’re completely surrounded, but I didn’t see anyone make it out.

I spot several people making pleas to the officers, asking to leave, but nobody is being allowed out of the containment area. The officers are soon met with chants of Your Jobs Next from the crowd. I wander around for a few minutes exploring the police lines, but soon decide to take a seat on the pavement outside the Manchester Royal Eye Hospital, and watch events unfold. A few small scuffles take place but the police have the area under their control. (Whilst I certainly didn’t appreciate the tactics used on me by the GMP, I do have to admire the execution of the containment itself, which must have been long-rehearsed, and initially proved impenetrable.)

After a while, I notice several people being allowed to leave in the opposite direction – back towards Rusholme – and decide to see whether I can get out of the kettle. I approach several of the officers, explaining that I wish to leave this way. After some initial hostility and suspicion I am allowed to leave, with the police making it explicitly clear that they don’t want to see me again for the rest of the day. I believe the fact that I was on my own at this point (and that I don’t resemble a typical university student) certainly worked to my advantage here.

Now free, I backtrack along Oxford Road, then make a turn onto Hathersage Road and along Upper Brook Street. In my absence, several protesters manage to break through the police lines and this initial containment ends. Many of the protesters continue their march, with several other containments taking place shortly after. I make my way towards the city centre to meet up with a friend, and we re-encounter the protest (although now diminished in numbers) as it moves past the town hall, towards Cross Street. By this point I’ve managed to hurt my leg and decide to retire to a local bar to rest.

However, as we walk through Manchester city centre, there is a police presence the like of which I’ve never before encountered. Officers are guarding all entrances to the Arndale Shopping Centre, and a line of police horses block the entrance to Market Street. Using Twitter, we discover that the final group of around 100 protesters have been contained near the Hilton Hotel on Deansgate and that several more arrests have been made. At this point I decide to catch the next train home, having had more than enough excitement for one day.

So what did I learn from this experience? Firstly, despite the media reports, I saw no violence taking place whatsoever, and the initial march and rally were entirely peaceful, family-friendly events. Secondly, the police will not hesitate to contain your movements if they decide they don’t like what you’re up to, although some of this I would suggest is a method of dissuading participants from attending future protests, which is especially effective should protesters feel unnerved or distressed by being contained or ‘kettled’ by officers.

Finally, I learnt that peaceful protest is (and always has been) an efficient way to get your voice heard when nobody else appears to be listening. In the case of this protest, the good people of Manchester certainly made it clear that they’re not going to accept lying-down an ideologically-driven austerity agenda which will endanger employment prospects, health and social mobility for people across the UK.

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A selection of my photos from the day are shown below, and Manchester Confidential caught an image of me (well, the side of my head) from during the police kettle, which can be found here.