Ayuso avoids giving data on the impact of the strike at Madrid's public universities
The unions say the first day of protests saw between 50% and 90% participation, according to the campus.
BarcelonaThe government of Isabel Díaz Ayuso has avoided providing figures on the participation in the strike that began this Wednesday at Madrid's public universities to protest the underfunding that is "suffocating" higher education. While the Madrid government has tried to downplay the protest, claiming that it is "politicized" and "has no justification whatsoever," the organizers of the strike say that participation has ranged between 50% and 90%, depending on the campus. The student platforms of Madrid's six public universities (Complutense, Rey Juan Carlos, Carlos III, Autonomous University of Madrid, Polytechnic University, and University of Alcalá de Henares) called the strike, which will continue until tomorrow, with the support of the unions CCOO, UGT, CGT, and CNT. The protest is in response to the budget proposal put forward by the government of the Community of Madrid.which will increase funding for public universities by 6.5%. Student groups consider this insufficient because, according to their calculations, the budget for public higher education will only increase from 0.44% of the regional GDP to 0.46%, and they believe that anything less than approaching 1% is inadequate. Conversely, the executive branch previously argued that the education budget represents more than 4% of the entire budget of the Community of Madrid.
Although the Díaz Ayuso government has declined to provide figures on the protest, the CCOO union has reported that on the first day of the strike, participation was between 85% and 90% at the Complutense University, and between 80% and 85% at the Rey Juan Carlos University and the Autonomous University of Madrid. According to the union, the universities with the lowest participation rates were the University of Alcalá de Henares (between 50% and 60%) and the Polytechnic University, with 60%.
The executive blames "the pro-independence quota"
Following several protests on Madrid's public university campuses and images of empty classrooms, the spokesperson for the Community of Madrid government, Miguel Ángel García Martín, dismissed claims that public universities are underfunded, asserting that their budget has increased by more than 20% since 2019. The Minister of Education, Science, and Universities, Emilio Viciana, believes the protests have "no justification." He does, however, believe that what he calls "the pro-independence quota," which will cost Madrid universities 170 million euros annually, warrants protest. Viciana also explained that the Community of Madrid is working on a new funding model that will be included in the regional draft law on Higher Education, Universities, and Science. The university platforms that are calling for the strike reject this proposal because they believe it will not end underfunding and that, furthermore, "it aims to advance the privatization of the university system and establish a tool for the regional government to control public universities."
