Normal blog service will resume shortly, but for now I just wanted to reflect briefly on the resignation of someone I am proud to call a close friend and comrade.

Normal blog service will resume shortly, but for now I just wanted to reflect briefly on the resignation of someone I am proud to call a close friend and comrade.

I don’t think that anyone who was present at the NEC meeting last week, where JK announced his resignation with a passionate and brutally honest statement, could possibly doubt the sincerity with which he described the conditions that led to his resignation.

I suspect that some people who read his resignation statement and some of you reading this blog have an instinctive mistrust of Labour Students. I’m certain that those who bullied and harassed JK to the point where he felt the need to resign and those who leapt upon his resignation with glee for political point scoring have their own political axes to grind.

The vicious campaign mounted against JK in Wales was absolutely disgusting. No one in an elected position should be expected to put up with such an appalling campaign of hate and harassment, whatever their political affiliation.

I don’t need to defend JK’s record as an activist and student leader. It speaks for itself. Years of experience and achievements as an activist for SWD and LGBT rights. Championing educational equality, access and the right of Welsh students to be educated in their first language. Actually putting Further Education at the heart of NUS Wales’ work rather than just paying lip service to it. And yes, campaigning avowedly and unwaveringly in favour of a Free, Fair and Funded Education. If actions speak louder than words in this regard, JK has shouted louder than anyone, with the largest ever national demo in Wales and a successful vote in the Welsh Assembly at a time when other parts of our National Union could only muster a whimper. His resignation is a loss for Wales and a loss for NUS as a whole.

Today is World Mental Health Day. I hope that our National Union and its Constituent Members can look carefully at what has happened to JK in Wales and ensure that all the principles we promote with our Mental Health campaigning are actually put into practice.

I’ll leave you with the full text of JK’s resignation speech.

Wes

James Knight Resignation Speech

In a recent blog, an NEC colleague said that it takes a big person to admit that they were wrong, and a bigger person to try and change things. And it gives me no pleasure or satisfaction to stand here, trying to be that bigger person.

Because, I was wrong.

In June I was signed off sick due to stress and depression, signed off at a crucial time in the top-up fees debate in Wales. It was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do: prioritising my mental well-being over my sense of duty, loyalty and responsibility to students in Wales.

I made that decision then because the price of staying to fight top-up fees was too high. Because it was a price no-one should ever have to pay.

Most of you know what I have been through over the last few months, but perhaps some of you don’t. Perhaps some of you don’t know that I was victimised, bullied and harassed. Perhaps some of you don’t know that I received hate mail, and abusive phone calls in the middle of the night. And perhaps some of you don’t know about the sustained campaign of hatred run against me the even hit the Welsh media.

But you can understand that someone who has been an SwD activist within NUS for 4 years, who put the issue of LGBT mental health on the political radar in NUS, you can understand why I took the decision to stop NUS from hurting me.

And I don’t choose my words lightly. Certainly, the people sending the hate mail, the press releases, the people screaming down the phone at me that I was ‘queer scum’ who should ‘??? off out of Wales’ – certainly they weren’t on the NEC.

But they were allowed to do so by NUS and by the NEC. Not by any one person, but by the culture within the organisation. An organisation of the most crass, base hypocrisy, because it is happy to talk about fighting for the rights of students with mental ill health but determined to do nothing. Happy to talk about equal opportunities and accessibility but persistent in doing nothing.

Where were the disciplinary procedures to tackle the harassment I was subjected to? What about my right to work in an environment free from prejudice and discrimination?

And people wonder why I didn’t sign the NEC agreement that was so explicit in detailing the responsibilities I had - to pay any outstanding money to NUS before I left - and so nebulous about providing for the safety and well-being of NEC members.

Philosopher Edmund Burke is famous for saying: “All that is required for evil to triumph is for good people to do nothing”, and is in this way that I have been most let down by NUS.

Many here saw the abuse I faced as it was happening. And you did nothing. Many here saw how it affected me, saw that I was driven to injury and illness and you did nothing. And in the two months I have been back, many of you have seen that things haven’t changed, the hate is still there, and still –you-do-nothing.

I said that I was wrong. Wrong because I thought that NUS would consider my needs after seeing me so ill. Wrong because I attributed compassion to those who victimised me – hoping that when they saw the consequences of their actions they would stop.

The fact that those who systematically degraded, dehumanised and disabled me come from unions that pay high affiliation fees is not an excuse to sit back and to say nothing. Neither is the fact that I’m a Labour Student.

I said that I was wrong, and that it takes a bigger person to try and change things. The time has come to draw a line in the sand, and to say ‘no more’. The time has come to take a stand against bullying and harassment, not just in words but in deeds.

The time has come, again, for me to put me and my mental well-being first.

I hereby resign as President of NUS Wales. I want no part of an organisation that so readily puts petty politics before mental and emotional well-being. And I want no part in the charade that we are an accessible organisation that respects diversity or that values different ability.

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