This week was extremely busy and long by anyones standards, but it was also a frustrating public transport week, with delayed trains, lost tickets and traffic jams affecting my schedule, which is highly annoying for a perpetual organizer and planner like me!

Monday was a visit up to Sheffield Hallam to discuss with Phil Wood the strategic review that BUSA are going through and any implications for student represenatation, I also got to see their lovely new building which was really bizarre for me as I used to go clubbing in it to a night called Insomniacs when it was the National Centre for Popular Music! Believe me it looks a very different place now! As the train was delayed I only was there for an hour before Phil had to rush off to Governors meeting.

As the Convenor of the Affiliation team, we had our first meeting in HQ on the Tuesday, we discussed an affiliation strategy, how we can get new affiliates, we had Mel Ward on speaker phone to update us on Glasgow, we also talked about Unions who were grumbling about disaffiliation. We were very keen to try to assess the impact that the letters about affiliation fee debt had had on unions. I had to dash off up to Demontford SU for a debate on the funding of Student Activities but my train was late and I missed the AGM and therefore the debate at the end of the meeting, so so sorry Matt and Co. I HATE TRAINS!

Wednesday and Thursday were extremely stressful for me as I was collating the Report and Plan, sounds easy doesn’t it? Well you try to get 27 people to stick to a deadline and hand in their reports on time even though you’ve given them months of notice and reminded them regularly. I was ripping my hair out for two days and I’m sure the NEC hated me for being such a nag, but I don’t care because it worked! For the first time ever the Report and Plan was online before regional conferences, ensuring greater accessibility, accountability and transparency, allowing officers to read the report and plan before having opportunities to question us on it at regional conferences. It was also in a new layout, dividing areas of responsibilities into Zones that reflect the Zones we have at Annual Conference, this again allows you to compare the mandates passed with the work being done, allowing you to greater hold us to account. Anyway if you haven’t seen this document go to www….. and see for yourself. On the Wednesday evening I went to the Mayor’s “only united communities can defeat terrorism, defend our civel liberties” meeting in Westminster. It was amazing the range of people that were there to speak out against the terrorism bill going through parliament, from all areas on the political and religious spectrums. It really opened my eyes to the consequences that may occur should this bill passed and made me even angrier about the 90 day detention proposal. However, there were 20 or so speakers so the meeting took about three and a half hours which I thought was slightly execessive! Shami Chakrabati from Liberty was as impressive as ever and I loved hearing Tony Benn speak, who I haven’t had the pleasure of hearing before.

On 13th October Kat and I with the National Director met with Frank Rhodes who is one of the Directors of our charities and who was involved in NUS way back when, he actually lost out on National President by 2 votes! He is a great supporter of the National Union and is one of our greatest “Friends of NUS”. On the 14th I went into work in the morning then traveled up to Leeds to visit Leeds and Leeds Met then popped over to York as I was doing a Freshers Fayre there on the Saturday morning. It was a really amazing Fayre and I have never seen such an array of different clubs and societies. The President and I then went off to watch the football before I had to head home, his team Newcastle lost to Wigan!! Sorry Mickey!

The thing about this job (and I’m not complaining) is that it seems to be pretty much every day, every evening, every weekend even if there is no meeting, event or visit, there are the phone calls, even if there are no phone calls, meetings, events or visit there is the constant thought that emails are piling up or that you know you have a million and one things to do that you don’t have time to do. Unfortunately you have to prioritise and that means some things don’t get done, or get done late we do do our best for our membership but at times its nigh on impossible because there are just not enough hours in the day. As someone said to me the other day, “if I had just one wish, it would be more time” and that’s the problem. I’m sure so many officers go through the same thing as we do on the NEC and we all have to recognize that we must, sometimes take time for ourselves, if we don’t we will crash and burn and be no good to anyone. Its getting near that time of year when everyone needs a break, so even if its leaving the office at 5 instead of 9 and turning your phone off, putting a DVD pn and eating comfort food all evening, take some time to relax. You, like I probably need it!

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