Last
updated: 08/04/08
Conference
says No
Students
inflicted the biggest defeat on the National Union of Students’
Labour leadership for 20 years when they rejected a new constitution
in a shock vote on April 1.
NUS conference sees 1,500 students elected from universities and colleges
across the country coming together every year to set the policy of their
national union. But this year, the very first vote the conference faced
was on whether to ‘ratify’ a new constitution - and abolish
itself.
The reformers needed 717 votes for a two thirds majority, but only secured
692 for the executive’s plan which would have removed the power
of left-wing groups from the democratic process.
If the changes had passed, then the conference would have been replaced
with a much smaller rally, called ‘congress’, and a series
of ‘zone conferences’ that would discuss policy but not
actually vote on it. An appointed board of ‘professionals’
would have run the union instead of students.
At the conference NUS president, Gemma Tumelty, said: “You’ve
heard from students from all political parties and none. These changes
haven’t been forced on you from up high. These are your ideas.
Will you vote yes to an NUS of the future? Or, no, let’s stick
with irrelevant out of date structures?”
“When
I first came to conference I was bewildered. Our structures and our
culture are holding us back - you’ve got the opportunity to change
that for good,” she added.
National secretary, Stephen Brown called the union’s democratic
structures ‘useless’ and claimed that without change the
union couldn’t deliver what its membership asks of it.
Tumelty and vice-president Wes Streeting, among others, had spent most
of the year promoting the new constitution: touring universities and
highlighting what they see as shortcomings in the democratic structures
of NUS stating that ‘change is needed’. NUS also spent over
£100,000 on a management consultant to help write the 59-page
reform document.
Part-time NUS executive member Rob Owen said it was nothing less than
Labour’s attempt to “smash the union”, while Sofie
Buckland, another part-timer, accused the leadership of running a “dirty
war” against their critics.
The new constitution needed a two-thirds majority to pass, but Save
NUS Democracy campaigners persuaded students to defeat the changes by
just 25 votes - despite a huge rally before conference to support the
reforms, and the fact that the vote’s chair, Kat Stark, was known
to be a strong supporter.
She initially refused to count the vote, saying it was ‘clearly
twothirds’. Some of the ‘I’m Choosing Change’
t-shirt wearers were in tears as the count went against them and requests
for a recount were denied.
The winning side chanted, “the students, united, will never be
defeated”. Stark’s horrified face was blown up on the big
screen for all to see.
After losing the vote, a clearly upset Tumelty got up and blasted the
third who had voted against as ‘extremists’ and ‘wreckers’.
She said: “I won’t give you the satisfaction of destroying
NUS. Change will be back.”
Streeting said the constitution had been defeated by a “ranting
hard left” and vowed to keep trying to push the reforms through.
When delegates began to jeer at him, he
hit back: “Every single year you boo me, but I couldn’t
care less!”
Hind Hassan, from the University of Leeds, said their attitudes showed
their ‘arrogance’: “Over one third of this hall thought
that the governance review was lacking ... that’s not an extremist
minority,” she said.
The new structures would have increased the influence of businesses
and corporations, while minimising the power of groups that NUS chief
executive Matt Hyde has openly referred to as a ‘hard left’
with ‘disproportionate influence’.
The NUS’ leadership now find themselves facing disaffiliation
by unions like Imperial College, which had threatened to leave the union
unless the changes passed. A number of the more right-wing unions are
believed to be planning to hold ‘no to NUS’ votes at the
same time, making them more difficult for the organisation to fight.
Speeches
by the leadership calling NUS ‘useless’
and ‘desperately in need of reform’ will now come back to
bite them.
Meanwhile,
Wes Streeting has told the Guardian that he believes he “lost
the vote on a technicality”, and that he will try to force the
changes through at two successive ‘emergency conferences’
he will call for this year.
by
Tom Walker - Conference correspondent
