With students from Cambridge and King's College London, we entered Parliament Square on 9 December en route to a planned protest vigil against the education bill (Report, 13 December). Once in we found we could not get out. We saw police use batons on people who had done nothing aggressive, charge groups with horses when there was no escape route, and detain thousands of people – including minors – without food, water, adequate heat or sanitation for hours.
This "kettling" cannot have been a response to criminal activity, as the police have claimed, since it began early in the day, and was clearly a tactic planned well in advance. If so, it was dramatically counterproductive: at 5.30pm, after the vote, most of the crowd might have dissipated, but instead were forced to remain. Only then did the level of violence escalate dramatically. When one of us suggested to the police that they intervene to check a drift towards malicious damage when some youths started to break windows, this was ignored and allowed to develop into a significant problem. The police authorities at no point attempted to explain what was happening, or what they wished us to do until, somewhat after 8.30pm, they drove us with batons and shields into a tight mass on Westminster Bridge, where we continued to be detained for a further two hours.
No explanation was offered for what amounted to mass internment, in very dangerous circumstances, of a crowd of demonstrators. The government and the police must consider the consequences of blocking legitimate forms of political expression. Last week's bad education law goes against the spirit of article 32 of the universal declaration of human rights, which urged free education "directed to the full development of the human personality"; does this government also intend to abrogate articles 9 and 20, with their protection against arbitrary detention and guarantee of free assembly?
Richard Drayton Rhodes professor of imperial history, Kings College London
Charles Jones Reader in international relations, University of Cambridge
Simon Szreter Professor of history and public policy, University of Cambridge
Usman Ali and others (Letters, 10 December) point out the impact of student debt on Muslim students, many of whom will not accept a system of interest-bearing loans. Here in Brent, our diverse community has been aware of this issue for some time, not least because the Liberal Democrat MP for Brent Central raised it in her maiden speech in parliament. Now that she has voted in favour of the rise in tuition fees (Report, 10 December), I share the anger felt by Brent residents, not least in the Muslim community, who supported Sarah Teather on the basis of her clear position on this policy. There is no way to wriggle out of this one – she has abandoned her principles and her constituents, in exchange for a pay rise and personal power.
Leader of Brent council