In a recent blog, NUS VP Welfare, Ama Uzowuru, raised a number of alarming and important issues that arose during the course of NUS’ regional conference week just a fortnight ago. The incidents she described require us to take on board some valuable lessons, not just about the society in which we live, but about the racism that can occur under our very noses or, perhaps even more worryingly, as a result of our own actions.

Judging from the reactions on Facebook and various message boards, I wish I could feel confident that a climate now exists where we can discuss those incidents and lessons, honestly and openly.

Conduct of NUS officers

I want to deal first with the issue that everyone seems to be talking about: an incident in a minibus between Coventry and Brighton. I have received formal calls for an inquiry into this situation. The facts, as presented by Ama, are not in dispute by any of the individuals present at the time.

For the record, I was present in the car at the time. In the middle of a heated discussion which got rapidly out of hand I intervened because one of the individuals involved was driving the car and his involvement in an argument presented a serious safety risk to all concerned and made it clear that we should continue the discussion upon arrival in Brighton. While this was the right thing to do and whilst I, and the other passengers bluntly aired our condemnation of the ignorant comments made - to the individual concerned - none of that matters. What matters was that Ama was left feeling as though the other passengers didn’t support what she was saying and had to take on the issue alone, the sole black woman in the car. For that, I unreservedly apologised to Ama. Hindsight is a wonderful thing – what a difference a simple sentence would have made in that car.

What have I learned from this situation? I make the following conclusions:

1. That someone with a record of anti-racist campaigning, who subscribes to NUS’ equal opportunities policy, is capable of making a clumsy, ignorant and – yes – racist remark. Does the question of intent matter? Yes it does. So does the individual’s remorse. It tells me that they’ve just hit a steep learning curve in pretty severe circumstances, but the solution is education, not victimisation.
2. That sometimes inaction can be almost as bad as a bad action. Each of us has a responsibility to confront racism head on – intended or not.
3. That the student movement, for all our virtues and our equal opportunities policies, is not free from discrimination or from bullying.

Tackling the issues

To those who are genuinely concerned by what has happened and especially to those who, to their credit, have actually written to NUS to try and get to the bottom of it let me say this: a “public inquiry” itself wouldn’t really achieve much in the sense that none of us in the car (for the record: myself, Richard Budden, Beth Walker and the source of the row Dave Lewis) do not contest Ama’s account of events. What do we actually want to achieve from this scenario? We could join the ednet and facebook bullies and try and hound someone to the point of depression or resignation or we could accept that Ama is satisfied that her colleague is truly sorry for a terrible mistake, promote a culture whereby people can make mistakes on sensitive issues and then turn to addressing the rest of the issues raised by her blog.

Ama’s blog raised so much of concern: that one in twenty Londoners vote BNP, that in times of economic hardship black people in Britain are at greater risk of racism and that the most senior black woman on the National Executive of NUS encounters racism on a regular basis – sometimes even during the course of her work.

It’s incredibly serious. Which is why I will be fully accepting and implementing the demands of the Black Students’ Campaign as just a first step. I want us to listen to what Ama said in her blog and what she’s said to me since. It’s not about scapegoats or witch hunts. It’s about the situation facing race relations in Britain in the 21st century. It’s about exposing and eliminating racism in our colleges and on our campuses and it’s about the world that 20% of our students find themselves in and 100% of students in the UK have a role in shaping. 
 

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