Let’s be clear about why I am for this review. The NUS current constitution is out of date, written for the HE unions of our grandparents, with fangled add-ons which have been tagged on by various conferences just adding more and more bureaucracy into the mix. FE makes up 70% of the membership but is only an after-thought in the current set-up. It is embarrassing that of the 27 members of our National Executive Committee (NEC), I am the only FE officer. That’s 26 HE. One FE. Representative? Hardly.

Quite simply, the new system is designed to increase our involvement. That’s why I support the change.

I was thinking about this as I sat at regional conferences last week. As usual there were only a handful of FE unions there. Why is this? Basically it’s because the current system doesn’t work for FE, with the result being that few people understand what NUS, they feel out of touch and unable to get involved. For example, go to Annual Conference and FE hardly gets a look in. The review aims to change that with the creation of a new, specific FE Zone Conference.

This means more policy will be passed and NUS will have a greater remit for campaigning on FE issues.

The new zonal conferences system will be more accessible, with more unions able to contribute, moving away from the archaic terminology of “conference believes, further believes, resolves”. Instead we are moving towards a charter/statement of beliefs, which are agreed through productive conversation and dialogue, instead of the current ridiculous 30/60 second speeches which do nothing to inform first time delegates, but just add to the confusion.

In another major change, the block of 12 will be removed, and instead there will be named and non-portfolio volunteers. Each policy Zone will have a number of students as volunteers, elected at the conference, who volunteer over the course of their term on NUS matters specifically relating to that Zone- e.g. an FE Zone volunteer will contribute to work within the FE zone, a Welfare Zone volunteer will be part of that Zone. As well as this, there will be 15 non-portfolio officers on the Senate, elected at Annual Conference. Within this group of 15 there will be spaces specifically reserved for FE students. However this does not mean that only those specifically reserved places are for FE, all places are open for FE to run for, it just ensures that a minimum quota of FE are on.

On paper, the zonal conferences seem like even more dates in the diary for FE officers to attend, but this is not the case. One-off days in NUS’ current diary will be compounded into the zonal events, meaning more achieved in less events (currently there are 41 events in NUS’ event diary that FE officers can attend, which is just unfeasible for an average part time officer from a small union).

A quick run-down

Anyway, there is a lot of information about this governance review, so I’ll give you a quick run-down of what has been going on.

Keeping up has been especially hard for FE since many of the FE delegates who attended Annual Conference in March may have now left their union, and new officers have been elected. At this Conference, there was a vote in favour of an NUS governance review (motion 701: governance in NUS). After a great deal of consultation, a green paper- a first draft- was released. This again got a wide range of responses from individual officers, students’ unions, factions, interest groups and externals.

More recently the governance steering group (who were commissioned to lead the review) produced the final recommendations, which were brought to the NEC in a series of meetings. These were overwhelmingly adopted and have been released in the form of the white paper for you, the membership.

I’ve talked about the major points for FE and I wrote an FE specific FAQ on Officeronline

You can also find a summary of the changes here. Have a read.

After adopting the white paper, the NEC, myself included, asked the membership to call an Extraordinary Conference. We needed 25 calls from unions. We will probably end up with nearly 40. The result is that the Conference is happening in Leicester on December 4.

Over the past few weeks though I have been hearing a number of similar points from officers, and I’ll try to give you an answer now;

1) This has been sprung upon us and why is it all happening so suddenly…

Earlier this year, it was advertised on the NUS website (officeronline) for individuals, groups, interest groups, unions… basically anyone with an interest in NUS to respond to the Governance Green Paper. This was of course open for FE students and officers to contribute to.

As well as this, the NEC and NUS staff consulted with FE officers at regional conferences last term on the governance review.

FE officers were ALSO invited to join the Governance Steering group, however this was not taken up, so I joined to represent FE perspectives.

Since then, I’ve tried to talk to as many officers as possible about the governance review, to discuss their concerns, and to ensure they are forwarded onto the steering group.

FE officers have been involved, and have in fact called for Extraordinary Conference. It is realy positive that FE officers have a sense of ownership over the process.

As the proposed changes are constitutional changes, they must be ratified- i.e. formally accepted- by Conference twice.

It is important to that the constitutional changes have the opportunity to be ratified by the end of this academic year to ensure a smooth process, and for the successful changes to be in place for Conference 2008, rather than 2009, which is a vital year for NUS to be focused on lobbying on the top-up fees review, and not internal affairs.

Also, from our perspective as FE Officers, it is so important that as many of us as possible are able to track the NUS governance review from start to beginning. I know from experience, the FE union life cycle is usually a year, two at max before all officers have moved on, and new officers have taken their place. So it is important FE officers take on the challenge of making the governance changes and stopping another year of FE officers having to put up with the NUS mis-serving them, poorly representing them and not keeping the priorities of FE students high on the agenda of NUS.

Anyway, if you do have an issue with the process, hold me and my fellow NEC to account through national council, but don’t delay the process any longer.

2) We can’t afford to take time off for another NUS event

The short answer to this is that change needs to come through, and if you want your voice to start being properly heard within NUS, you can’t afford NOT to take time off.

3) We can’t afford to send delegates as our block grant is so small.

If you have any problems about attending democratic events, please don’t immediately rule them out, contact us.

It angers me that I can pretty much predict those FE unions who will be able to attend Extraordinary and Annual Conference, due to their circumstances, but it really is important that as many people as possible attend.

But the issues of participation for FE unions at this Conference aren’t unique. Overall FE Unions are under-resourced, under-funded and under-supported, which inevitably will directly affect your participation in NUS. And that’s something myself and NUS staff have been committed to changing with you for a number of years. We are seeing that progress, but we need the governance changes to keep that momentum.

And we can’t wait.

Extraordinary Conference has been called, the details are now up online, and we are mandated to take our governance process onto the next step.

I believe the proposed changes will alter NUS for the better, with more FE unions able to get involved, and if that means one more poorly attended, HE centric and dominated event, in order to change it for the long term, then I’m for it.

If we can change that, get more grassroots students involved and make our work more relevant and accessible to them, well that can only be a good thing.

If we don’t change NUS’ structures, I fear FE officers down the line will still be experiencing the same problems of having their voices drowned out in their own National Union.

I'm sure you'll agree, the current structure of NUS in no way supports its FE Unions, which is why I am so determined to see things changed at an extraordinary conference.

But this has never been Beth Walker’s campaign, it’s the FE Campaign, and I believe that you will want to get involved, and that you want a National Union that fights for FE. So from here…

1. Contact me if you have any questions- beth.walker@nus.org.uk

2. Attend the schedules coming up

3. Attend extraordinary conference and be the year of FE officers that make the difference within the National Union of Students

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