Dear Delegate,

I am writing to you to express the grave concerns of the Black Students’ Campaign at the impact the proposed governance review will have on black students’ representation in NUS. The proposals would exclude the Black Students Officer from the most powerful decision-making body in NUS, and end the guarantee of representation for black students at every level of NUS.

Black students campaigned for decades to win a guaranteed voice at every level of NUS. That voice makes a real difference to the lives of Black students and ensures that NUS plays its role in challenging racism.  This is now threatened by the NUS leadership’s attempt to push through an almost identical version of the 'governance review' instead of respecting Annual Conference’s decision to vote against the proposals last April.

NUS Black Students Conference voted to overwhelmingly to oppose these changes to NUS' structures and to actively campaign to stop them. The minor changes proposed to last year's 'governance review' do not address our campaign’s concerns at the reduction in Black representation, and the erosion of democracy in NUS.

We urge all Black students, and all who support a diverse, representative and democratic NUS to vote down these damaging proposals again.

Both the content of the 'governance review' and the process through which it is proposed the changes will be introduced raise many concerns among Black students, and all those who support a representative and democratic NUS.

The governance review, and the process through which it is proposed to make changes would:

• End the guarantee of Black representation – and representation for Women, LGBT and Disabled students – at every level of decision-making. The proposals would remove the Black Students' Officer – and representatives of Women, LGBT and Disabled Students - from the 'Trustee Board',  a body with the "power to overrule", on legal and financial grounds, any other decision taken in NUS, including decisions of the Black Students' Campaign.
• Undermine diversity of participation at NUS Annual Conference. It is proposed that it will no longer be compulsory for students' unions to hold elections to select their delegation to Annual Conference, meaning the many black students, as well as minority groups and those representing minority political opinions, who are elected in the face of opposition from their students' union executive, will be prevented from attending Conference.
• Reduce the ability of NUS Conference to shape NUS policy: It is proposed that policy will be discussed at 'Zone Conferences' and then ratified at Annual Conference, with only limited debate. As Students' Unions would only be allowed to send one voting delegate to a Zone Conference, these events would be far less likely than Annual Conference to develop policy which represents the diverse views of students. The LGBT Campaign has also expressed its concern at this proposal, and the potential for a “reduction in minority students participating in NUS Democracy.”

• Allow vital decisions about NUS' future to be taken without adequate debate. The decision to hold an extraordinary conference – and, it is widely expected, a second extraordinary conference to ratify the proposals before Annual Conference 2009 – shows the NUS leadership are not concerned with making genuine improvements to NUS democratic structures. Instead their aim is to force through almost identical proposals to those rejected by last Annual Conference, by allowing decisions to be taken at Extraordinary Conferences, which are far less representative and democratic events. Fewer delegates are able to attend Extraordinary Conferences, and delegations are far less diverse and representative than those elected to Annual Conference. Many students’ unions have not held elections for their delegations, and some have been unable to afford to send a full delegation to this additional event.

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