Posts Tagged ‘NUS conference’

• Unions across the country oppose drastic reductions in delegate entitlements
• Fears that conference will be ‘sabbatical dominated’ and under-represent minorities

A number of sabbatical officers from University of London colleges have joined others from across the country in expressing opposition to reduced ‘delegate entitlements’ to NUS annual conference.

 Ironically these sabbaticals officers share a fear that the conference will become “sabbatical dominated” because of the changes. They also believe the changes will lead to a “significant reduction in representation of Liberation and other minority groups and their opinions.”

NUS LGBT national committee and the Black Students’ campaign are spearheading the opposition, and have drafted an open letter which says: “These cuts will set back years of work to increase participation…and lead to even less of a voice for grass-roots student activists. The plurality of annual conference is its greatest strength, and this will severely limit that. NUS Annual Conference should reflect the full diversity of our movement, not simply the sabbatical elite.

The rebellion comes after NUS halved the number of delegates that most universities could send to annual conference. Queen Mary’s entitlement went from 8 last year to 4 for 2010. Meanwhile UCL saw 13 delegates cut to 6 and King’s went from 12, last year, to 6.

The quota system was established by the new Democratic Procedures Committee (DPC) which, at NUS Annual Conference last year, was mandated to increase representation of part-time students whilst freezing budget for conference.

Unions with more part-time students, including Further Education (FE) institutions, have gained proportionally in comparison to those with fewer, but many have still seen a decrease in actual numbers.  

Daf Adley, NUS LGBT Officer, said “Students and student officers across the UK are rightly outraged by this radical decision being taken out of their hands and many students’ unions will officially oppose the move. The slashing of delegation sizes across the board is being achieved behind a smoke screen of increasing part-time student representation and budget cuts, but will in fact reduce Annual Conference’s size and completely change its demographic for the worse.

He added “I urge all students and student officers to sign the statement and get it endorsed by your union’s democratic structures.”

In London so far, Queen Mary’s and SOAS have passed motions against the change, the latter condemning the “attacks on the rights of ordinary students to engage with the union.”

Mas Naina, of NUS Black Student’s Committee, who proposed the motion at SOAS, said “1 in 5 students are black yet less than one 1 in 20 student officers are [black]. Under a system of one union one vote even fewer black students will be represented. The same is likely to apply to LGBT, women, and disabled students.”

In response, Rob Park, a Birkbeck Trustee who is part of the DPC, told London Student “The committee that made the decision didn’t take it lightly. The changes impacts uniformly across the board, and do help a number of FE colleges.

“For last 4 or 5 years NUS willfully overspent on its conference – it set a budget for 1000 delegates, then let it go up to 1400. NUS is now using HESA data instead of relying on numbers given by unions, but the delegate entitlements go out for consultation and people can object to it – whether on the figures or methodology.”

He added “Maybe conference didn’t quite know what it was voting for. There may be more of a movement to take it back to conference [in 2010] and say ‘we made a mistake’.”

Daf Adley echoed this, claiming “Annual conference was not aware of the repercussions – most students were under the impression that FE would increase its proportion but the size would remain the same.”

Another key complaint of those who oppose the changes is the lack of completion of an Equality Impact Assessment on the new constitution, which was demanded by an Extraordinary Conference last November.

On this, NUS President Wes Streeting said: “The assessor’s interim report of her Equality Impact Assessment showed that she was satisfied that ‘equality considerations…will play a part in the decision-making processes of both the NEC and the Trustee Board’. The only reason the final report has been delayed is that the assessor has been on long-term sick leave.”

Streeting continued “The overall number of delegates at NUS Annual Conference will still be just under 1,000 people. The majority of London colleges have either retained the same number of delegates at Annual Conference than in 2005, or actually have more delegates than in 2005.

“I have always been a proponent of ensuring diversity – political and otherwise – within our structures. I don’t believe these challenges will lead to a conference dominated by sabbatical officers and would be concerned if that were the case. I have said throughout the NUS reform process that we will continue to monitor the impact of our reforms and propose changes where necessary.”

Signatories to the letter of opposition to the new entitlements call on the DPC to re-consider its decision and resist any future “proposals that decrease representation”, as well as demanding that “further changes to the composition of Annual Conference are debated properly at every level of NUS”.

They aim to reverse the decision at annual conference 2010, and reject claims that budget requirements necessitated the change, arguing that resources should be reallocated. 

Bellavia Ribeiro-Addy, NUS Black Students’ Officer told London Student “The effect that these cuts will have on the diversity of NUS conference are exactly the kind of outcomes the Black Students and LGBT campaigns warned of when we demanded an equality impact assessment on the new constitution. Now that students’ unions have been hit across the board I hope they now appreciate the severity of the situation and join us in our attempts to overturn this decision.”

Two NUS officers have been censured for storming the stage at the NUS extraordinary conference in January. Read the rest of this entry »