On 11 August 2008, Ireland's Minister for Education and Science, Batt O'Keeffe, had indicated that fees for university students were back on the agenda in a move which contravened prior government policy. University fees were abolished in 1995 by the Fine Gael-Labour government. With university presidents putting pressure on the government to approve this proposal, Brian Lenihan announced an increase in the annual college registration fee by €600 on budget day. The Union of Students in Ireland (USI) arranged a protest in response to claims that any increase in tuition fees would prevent many from attending college. Despite intense garda presence, the 14:00 lunchtime protest of 15,000 students caused widespread traffic disruption in Dublin city centre, with the students gathering in Parnell Square ahead of a steel drum beating march down O'Connell Street, on to College Green, up Dawson Street and across Molesworth Street. The march culminated in a rally outside the national parliament at Leinster House as the protesters were addressed by student leaders and opposition politicians. In what the USI President Shane Kelly called "one of the largest student protests in years", students waved banners and placards imprinted with the slogans "education not recession", "free fees means more degrees" and "Enda Kenny (leader of the Opposition) would not approve of this" and chanted a multitude of dialogues such as "no cutbacks, no fees, no Fianna Fáil TDs" and "education is a right not a privilege". TDs and senators waited at Leinster House to address the students upon their arrival included Labour Party education spokesperson Ruairi Quinn, Fine Gael education spokesperson Brian Hayes, Sinn Féin Senator Pearse Doherty and Independent Senator Ivana Bacik. There were no arrests and no trouble was reported. Quinn stated it was possible that the students demands would be met since the government had backed down on the budgetary issues of medical cards and income levies. A spokeswoman for Minister for Education and Science Batt O'Keeffe was said to have responded to a request to meet student leaders but later cancelled this "due to commitments arising following the budget". Since then, a number of government ministers have encountered hostility from students whilst visiting campuses at University College Dublin and National University of Ireland, Galway. Three people were arrested for breaches of the peace following two minor scuffles as 100 students took part in a banner-bearing protest at the Clinton Institute on the Belfield campus of UCD on 20 October 2008. Brian Lenihan was to chair a function at the Institute but met with a blockade as students responded to the proposed barrier to their education by creating a physical barrier of their own against the Minister.