Video: Julie Bishop mobbed by angry uni students (ABC News)
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Foreign Affairs Minister Julie Bishop has been heckled by students unhappy about cuts to higher education while on a visit to the University of Sydney.
Ms Bishop was meeting the first group of students travelling to Singapore under the Federal Government's New Colombo Plan, a scheme which offers Australian undergraduates grants to study in the Indo-Pacific region.
Bebe D'Souza from the Sydney University Union says the minister was not fazed by the action, which attracted about 200 students.
"Julie Bishop came up the stairs surrounded by police and then all of the students kind of surrounded [her] and the police," she said.
"[The students were] yelling 'shame' and talking about how terrible these cuts on education are going to be for ordinary students.
"Julie Bishop kind of just like looked bemused, she didn't look shameful at all, she looked proud of what she was doing."
The University of Sydney rally was addressed by student representative council education officer Ridah Hassan who said the group were "not going to let a bunch of rich politicians who get six-figure salaries and pensions funded by taxpayers tell us there's no money in the budget for education or healthcare".
"Quality and affordable education should be a right for all, not a privilege for the super wealthy," she said.
The students vowed to return in bigger numbers on May 21 for the national day of action to defend education against fee deregulation.
Ms Bishop confronted a similar incident on Friday morning at an event at the University of Technology Sydney.
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