NUS Extraordinary Conference -> Change was Chosen!

Change was chosen!

The NUS Extraordinary Conference took place on Tuesday and over two-thirds of the delegates voted in favour of the new NUS structure.

All 17 Birmingham delegates (elected only one day before Conference!) were mandated by Guild Council to vote for change and we therefore all supported the NUS Reform on behalf of all the students at the University of Birmingham.

Why was the old structure rubbish?

The NUS have heard no short amount of complaints about how they are run for years and years. Criticisms include:-

• NUS Conference is inefficient. The format is too complex for 1200 people. It is intimidating for new delegates and hard to engage with.
• The NEC are an all-engulfing powerful body. There is no separation of powers between the political side of the NUS and the admin/legal side of the NUS.
• Anti-racism work needs more focus. International Students, Mature Students and Part-time Students are pooly-represented.

Why is the new structure so much better?

• Zone Conferences have been created. Each Zone will focus on a different issue: Higher Education, Further Education, Welfare, Society & Citizenship and Union Development.
• These Zone Conferences are smaller and more informal. Students can debate in workshops, gather evidence and construct more careful motions to be submitted to Annual Conference.
• The Zones will therefore be more accessible to new members, Unions can collaborate on policy and contentious issues can be resolved in debate before the motions even reached Conference.
• There is indeed a separation of powers and the new Trustee Board for the NUS has external, experienced and informed lay members who can assist in administration and legal decisions.
• This allows the NUS Officers more time to run campaigns and actually make change! The new structure has a full-time International Students' Officer, part-time roles for Mature & Part-time Students and a taskgroup dedicated to ARAF work.

Overall, it was a very exciting day and most was spent addressing changes or ammendments which Unions had addressed. The good ammendments were accepted (Bristol suggested an ARAF Committee be created) and the bad ammendments fell (Bradford suggested all delegates should be elected by cross-campus ballot but this is not possible for many FE colleges!)

As the day progressed, it looked like we were not going to reach the final vote because it was common knowledge that we were getting kicked out at 6pm. Those opposing the Reform therefore began filibustering and stalling by voting for no confidence in the Chair and asking for a secret ballot! Luckily, both were rejected and we reached the final vote with 30 minutes to spare!

This was the most exciting day of politics I have ever had and we left knowing that we had made a real difference. The largest ever change in NUS democracy had taken place and we (and therefore Birmingham) had helped it happen.

Three cheers for change!