Prime Minister Chris Hipkins has come under fire from University of Otago staff and students over proposed cuts of several hundred jobs.
His visit to a university student forum came on the last day staff were able to take up the offer of voluntary redundancy to help save $60 million.
Dunedin is a Labour stronghold but there was little love from protesters meeting the Prime Minister.
"Stand up! Fight back!" the crowd chanted.
His security detail kept a subtle eye on the crowd - but what wasn't so subtle was the writing quite literally on the wall: "Oppose Labour's cuts to Otago."
"Operational autonomy forces our uni to operate as a business where students are a commodity rather than a public good and tertiary education is a public good," one student told Hipkins.
Hipkins fronted up for a Question Time of a different kind.
"I don't think we have an overly commodified system at the moment," he said. "Universities do still need to be able to balance their books."
"We have a $60 million budget hole. Why can't you just fix it?" another student asked.
To help save that money several hundred jobs are on the chopping block.
"Yesterday at the staff forum, staff were told that jobs were going to go right across the whole University," University of Otago Associate Professor Brian Roper said.
While enrollments are down the lack of Government funding against inflation is also being blamed.
"I think the demonstration that we saw outside spoke quite loudly that this is an issue that students really are concerned about and the biggest question most students seemed to ask was 'can we fix this?'" Otago University Students' Association (OUSA) president Quintin Jane said.
The Government has given its answer.
"The universities make their own decisions about how they manage their finances so it's not something that we can intervene with," Hipkins said.
Friday was the final day for staff to signal their intention to take a voluntary redundancy or fight on.
