National Union of Students (United Kingdom)

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The National Union of Students (NUS) is the main federation of students' unions that exist inside the United Kingdom. Although the NUS is the central organisation for all affiliated unions in the UK, there also exist the national bodies NUS Scotland, UCMC/NUS Wales and NUS-USI in Northern Ireland.

NUS is a member of ESIB, the National Unions of Students in Europe.

History

The NUS was formed in 1922 at a meeting held at the University of London. At this meeting, the Inter-Varsity Association and the International Students Bureau (which organised student travel and had been lobbying for a national body) agreed to merge. Founding members included the unions of University of Birmingham, Imperial College London (who first left in 1923 and have subsequently rejoined and left again twice - the last time being in the 1970s), King's College London who supplied the first President (Sir Ivison Macadam) and the University of Bristol.

Financial crisis

In recent years the NUS has faced a prolonged financial crisis, caused by a coinciding of spiralling expenditure and decreasing income. A series of measures were proposed to address this, of which the most controversial included a series of changes to the constitutional and democratic processes. In 2004 two emergency conferences passed some of the changes proposed, albeit not without fierce dispute between those claiming the proposals were necessary reforms to maintain the existence of the organisation and those arguing that they were aimed at curbing democracy and involvement. In 2006 policy passed at Conference enabled NUS to launch a paid-for card in September. This card, called NUS Extra, will be on sale to students at £10.

Current issues

AUT/NATFHE (UCU) marking boycott controversy

In 2006 the Association of University Teachers (AUT) and the National Association of Teachers in Further and Higher Education (NATFHE), announced a one-day strike, to be followed by ongoing "action short of a strike" in the form of an assessment boycott (with the AUT, though not NATFHE, including the setting of exams in the boycott) as part of their pay negotations with the Universities and Colleges Employers Association (UCEA), with many lecturers and teachers not marking exam papers.

Initially the NUS leadership, headed by Kat Fletcher, gave support to the lecturers' union arguing that it was essential to secure an increase in lecturers' wages; The understanding was that the NUS was not supporting the AUT-only boycott of setting or marking exams. However this support was not reflected across all students' unions affiliated to NUS and some tabled an emergency motion to the 2006 NUS National Conference; however this was not debated. This has provoked strong criticism that the NUS stance on one of the major education issues of the day has been decided without consultation of the membership.

Subsequently a number of students' unions went public with their opposition to both the boycott and the NUS support for it. A member of the NUS National Executive-elect drafted a counter letter in support, signed by a number of students' unions, whilst direct online petitions of students opposed to the boycott attracted an ever growing number of signatures. . A petition completely in favour of the boycott has so far attracted rather fewer signatures.

An opinion poll jointly commission by London Student and Times Higher found that 77% of students are opposed to the boycott, although 67% support the general principle of increasing lecturers' pay.

Many have criticised the NUS as unrepresentative of its members, and have questioned to what extent the NUS actually represents students' interests. Some students' unions have gone so far as to threaten to withhold part of their affiliation fees. Many other students' unions have maintained support for the teaching unions, including some which have agreed to go beyond the NUS stance, backing the AUT/NATFHE action fully. (The poll was published after many students' unions had already adopted their pro-boycott stance, and it is not clear to what extent the student unions were already aware of student opposition.)

The NUS have since advised AUT/NATFHE, following feedback from over 100 unions, that their partial support for action cannot be indefinite and is wholly dependent on seeking a fast resolution. This seems to have had an effect as a pay deal has now been reached by the newly merged lecturers union, the University and College Union (UCU).

Democracy

The NUS holds national conferences once a year. National Conference is the sovereign body of NUS, and is where NUS policy is decided. Other conferences, such as Regional Conferences, Women's Conference, Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Trans Conference (changed as of 2004), Students With Disabilities Conference, Black Students' Conference and the International Students' Conference (created in 2004) are run to enhance the representation of the specific members they include.

Most of these conferences, and in particular the elections held at them, are hotly contested by factions including Labour Students, Education Not for Sale, the Organised Independents, Student Broad Left, Socialist Students, Socialist Workers' Student Society, Conservative Future and Liberal Democrat Youth and Students. In addition to these political factions, interest groups such as the Union of Jewish Students and the Federation of Student Islamic Societies are deeply involved in the internal democratic processes of NUS.

Membership

All UK students' unions are able to join the NUS (providing they are not controlled by their parent institution and their admission is approved by National Conference). To become a constituent member, unions must pay an affiliation fee to NUS, which is based upon the number of students in the union, and the money received by the union from its parent institution.

The NUS now has over 700 constituent members (the unions of either higher education or further education establishments) through which it represents approximately 5 million UK students, which equates to approximately 98% of all students and hence potential members. However, a small number of high profile educational institutions are not members. These include the University of Glasgow, University of St Andrews, University of Dundee, University of Southampton, Open University, and Imperial College London. In recent years NUS membership has become a controversial issue with some unions seeing general meeting motions and referendums on the membership issue.

The NUS have in the past received criticism for spending significant amounts of time and money in running pro-affiliation campaigns at universities to ensure that they win referendums. No quorate referendum has voted to disaffiliate from the NUS for at least a decade.

Recent leavers of the NUS have included UMIST (which is now reaffiliated through its merger to form UMSU), University of Sunderland and the University of Southampton.

Services

NUS offer a number of services to their constituent members. NUS also has a subsidiary company called NUS Services Ltd (NUSSL). NUSSL is essentially a purchasing consortium that allows its members to benefit from bulk purchasing discounts. NUS and NUSSL work closely with the Association for Managers in Students' Unions.

Criticisms

The NUS has come in for criticism from various quarters, particularly from those students' unions who are not affiliated. Sen Ganesh, then president of Imperial College Union, said in 2002: "NUS's claim to be representative of students is not borne out by their work".

The NUS has in particular has come in for criticism for the way its democratic processes are structured. Some have argued that the NUS National Conference is unrepresentative of the opinions of students across the country and that in turn the National Executive Committee does not always reflect the wishes and priorities of students. The NUS have countered, arguing that many of the criticisms are inaccurate.

Presidents

Presidents
Years of office	Name	Institution(s)	Faction
1922	Ivison S Macadam	King's College London
1922-23	A Gordon Bagnall	University of Oxford
1923-24	Ralph Nunn May	University of Birmingham
1924-25	F G G Carr	University of Cambridge
1925-26	W J Langford	University of Reading
1926-27	J E Meredith	University of Wales, Bangor
1927-29	F O Darvall	University of Reading
1929-30	Sam Cohen	University College, Cardiff
1930-31	H Trevor Lloyd	University of Bristol
1931-33	Denis Follows	University of London and University of Nottingham
1933-34	Charles G Gilmore	University of London
1934-36	F Lincoln Ralphs	University of Sheffield
1936-38	F Fraser Milne	University of London
1938-39	R R S Ward	University of Sheffield
1939-40	Brian Simon	University of Cambridge and University of London
1940-41	P A H Rivett	University of Leeds
1941-42	S G Checkland	University of Birmingham
1942-44	Jack T Allanson	University of Manchester
1944-46	A T James	University of London
1946-47	G Mcleavy	University of Leeds
1947-49	W Bonney Rust	University of London
1949-51	Stanley K Jenkins	University College, Cardiff
1951-52	John M Thompson	University of Manchester
1952-54	Fred Jarvis	University of Oxford
1954-56	Frank H Copplestone	University of Nottingham
1956-58	Roland Freeman	University of London
1958-60	Dennis J Grennan	University of Southampton
1960-62	J Gwyn Morgan	University of Wales, Aberystwyth
1962-64	A R Hughes	University of Wales, Aberystwyth
1964-66	T William Savage	Queen's University of Belfast
1966-68	T Geoff Martin	Queen's University of Belfast
1968-69	Trevor A Fisk	University of London
1969-71	Jack Straw	University of Leeds	Radical Student Alliance
1971-73	Digby Jacks	University of London	Left Caucus
1973-75	John Randall	University of York	Broad Left
1975-77	Charles Clarke	University of Cambridge	Broad Left
1977-78	Sue Slipman	University of Wales, Lampeter	Broad Left
1978-80	Trevor Phillips	Imperial College London	Broad Left
1980-82	David Aaronovitch	University of Manchester	Broad Left
1982-84	Neil Stewart	University of Aberdeen	NOLS
1984-86	Phil Woolas	University of Manchester	NOLS
1986-88	Vicky Phillips	University of East Anglia	NOLS
1988-90	Maeve Sherlock	University of Liverpool	NOLS
1990-92	Stephen Twigg	University of Oxford	NOLS
1992-94	Lorna Fitzsimons	Loughborough University	NOLS
1994-96	Jim Murphy	University of Strathclyde	NOLS
1996-98	Douglas Trainer	University of Strathclyde	NOLS
1998-00	Andrew Pakes	University of Hull	NOLS
2000-02	Owain James	University of Warwick	Organised Independent
2002-04	Mandy Telford	University of Strathclyde	NOLS
2004-06	Kat Fletcher	Sheffield College and University of Leeds	Campaign for Free Education (2004-5), Independent (2005-6)
2006-07	Gemma Tumelty	Liverpool John Moores University	Organised Independent

See also

• National Union of Students Areas

External links

• NUS Home
• NUS Website for Union Officers
• NUS Extra Card
• NUS Services Limited Website
• Fairtrade NUS Campaign, a campaign for NUS unions to stock tea and coffee accredited exclusively with the FAIRTRADE Mark.
• no2nus Group critical of NUS and encourages disaffiliation