Motions at the next NUS NEC – 23/1/14 – Part 1

Hi everyone

Just a quick update letting you know my thoughts on the motion submitted to this week’s NUS NEC. After last meeting where the motions debate was fairly uncontroversial, I think it’s fair to say a lot of people will be watching Thursday’s meeting (people tend to follow the #nusnec hashtag on Twitter) for some of the motions discussion.

The first motion up is the NUS ‘priority motion’ – each year the president can choose a motion which, if passed, will be put to NUS conference by the NEC as leading policy for the year. This is the substantive motion as moved by Toni Pearce (NUS President) and backed by various Labour Students and members of the NUS leadership:

A New Deal for the Next Generation

NEC Believes:

1. Continued attacks on the prospects of students both in education and in their communities represent a whole generation let down by those with power
2. A feeling of powerlessness and precariousness is increasingly common among the rising generation, squeezed by global recession and biting financial pressures, uncertain about its prospects and its future
3. We too often feel let down by politicians who fail to speak on our behalf in a world where the odds are already stacked against us
4. Young people and students’ prospects continue to worsen due to rising unemployment and living costs
5. Evidence from Ipsos Mori public opinion polling shows more than two thirds of people believe the UK government does not adequately consider future generations in the decisions it makes today
6. The next UK general election is due to take place on Thursday 7 May 2015

NEC Further Believes:
1. At the 2010 general election, just 44 per cent of those aged 18 to 24 voted, compared 76 per cent of the over 65s
2. The introduction of individual voter registration (IER) threatens to further reduce the number of students and young people voting
3. The gulf in voting levels between the generations leaves young people losing out in policy terms
4. That it is through students working with communities across the UK that we stand the best chance of achieving a new deal for the next generation.
5. That NUS’ approach to the general election needs to be both local and national, supporting students to win locally and on a national level. To win for students we will need public support, and this is best achieved through working together with people in the communities we live in and finding common cause.
6. That NUS analysis of the 2011 census data demonstrates that there are over 60 constituencies in the UK with over 10 per cent full time students, and that the strength of the student voice and the student vote should be reaffirmed at every opportunity.

NEC Resolves:
1. To campaign for a new deal for the next generation across the themes of education, work and community
2. To use the opportunity of the next General Election to win for students both locally and nationally
3. To continue and develop the new campaigning partnership between NUS and the Trades Union Congress (TUC) to work together for a better deal for students and workers through a strong collective voice
4. To work with external allies and partners to maximise voter registration and electoral participation among young people and students to ensure their voices are heard
5. To launch a general election hub in 2014, and support every students’ union to develop their own election strategy – supporting students to win both locally and nationally.
6. To empower students and to connect student communities with wider society, including through continuing our community organising work and training students as community organisers on their campuses and in their communities.

I think there are some major gaps in the direction of the motion, largely in that it is completely lacking in instruction to get political parties to take on NUS policy, and particularly the Labour Party. I’m supporting two amendments to this motion, the first deals with the instruction for parties to take on NUS police. Considering NUS’s role as a lobbying organisation (highlighted by its recent opposition to the Lobbying Bill), it does seem utterly bizarre to not include this in the general election strategy!

Delete NEC Further Believes 4 and 5 Add

NEC Further Believes 4. That NUS’ approach to the general election needs to be both local and national, supporting students to win locally and on a national level. 5. To achieve a new deal for the next generation we will need public support, and this is best achieved through working together with people in the communities we live in and finding common cause.

NEC Resolves
7. To campaign nationally for political parties to adopt NUS demands, taken from policies passed or ratified by National Conference, and chosen by NUS NEC.

My own amendment goes further still, highlighting NUS’s link with the Labour Party. I think it is vital that NUS is pressuring the party that actually has those links with the TUC, which it already mentions working with. The trade union link with Labour is a powerful mechanism of political pressure that is rarely used to its full effect. Not only this, but Labour Students makes up the political leadership of the NUS, with many full time officers and part time NEC members as active NOLS members. Funnily enough, the last time I put a motion to the NEC regarding mandating NUS to work with the Labour Party, I was told that ‘we shouldn’t be focusing just on one party’ and that ‘NUS is non-party affiliated’. Whilst this is technically true, it is completely dishonest coming from the NOLS faction within NUS, when the NUS is actually driven by Labour Party leadership policy. It’s time for the NUS leadership to be honest about its political affiliation and use it to good effect, starting with actually pushing the Labour Party to fight for students’ right in the next general election,

Delete Believes 6

In Further believes 5 delete ‘support students… national level’
Delete Further believes 6 from ‘and that the strength’
Delete Resolves 2
Delete Resolves 3 from ‘to work’
In Resolves 3 change ‘the Trades Union Congress (TUC)’ to ‘TUC’
In Resolves 5 delete ‘supporting students.. locally’

Add:

Believes: That while we want everyone to adopt NUS policies, we must focus on Labour, as the main opposition to the Coalition and a party with major input from the trade unions. Resolves: To make one focus a fight for Labour to adopt NUS policies on issues including education funding/student support, cuts and privatisation. The FTOs should initiate discussions with Labour-affiliated unions and left-wing Labour MPs with this aim, and report back to the NEC.

Another motion I am putting to NEC, which I believe is fairly self-explanatory, is regarding the policy of migration and open borders:

Motion 2: For a United Europe with Open Borders

NEC Believes:

1. The right-wing agitation about Bulgarian and Romanian workers coming to Britain.
2. The rise of UKIP.
3. That the rise in right-wing, nationalist agitation is resulting in such things as a major increase in racist bullying in schools (source: ChildLine).

NEC Resolves:
1. To issue a statement saying that all migrants should be welcome here and that “strain” on jobs and services is a result of the government’s cuts, which seek to boost profits and the wealth of the rich at the expense of all workers.
2. That this statement should also condemn UKIP, oppose British withdrawal from the EU and advocate a united fightback to level up conditions and rights, and win greater democracy, across Europe and beyond.
3. To make these themes a major part of our campaign around the 2014 Euro-election and 2015 General Election.

Last term I did a couple of talks around the immigration bill and the way that it is being used to attack international students and refugees. Whilst the EU is a capitalist institution, facilitating free trade across Europe, it does also allow the free movement of labour, and as a result, greater unity between workers organising in different countries. Right wing rhetoric around immigration is used to stir up hatred between different groups of working class people and distract them from the real attacks on their rights and living standards – which come from the rich.

Steph Lloyd, a leading Labour Students member and NUS Wales President, has proposed an amendment:

Delete all and add

NEC Belives:
1. The European elections will to be held on Thursday 22 May
2. The European elections often have a much lower turnout than the General Election which leads to an increase of power in the hands of voters that vote for far-right parties and candidates.
3. Currently the UK is represented by members of the BNP in the European Parliament and both Nick Griffin and Andrew Brones are seeking re-election.
4. The rise of UKIP is symptom of a much wider political narrative of the mainstreaming of anti-immigration rhetoric
5. NUS has a proud history of opposing racist, fascist and xenophobic views and also a proud history of campaigning against this European elections.

NEC Resolves:
1. For NUS UK to continue a principled stance on being pro-immigration and to challenge the wider racist, fascist and xenophobic views that feed into the rise of far-right political parties.
2. For this to the one of the main themes of our European elections.
3. To ensure NUS UK pushed voter registration and voter turnout for the European elections.

Whilst some of the points are true, and useful to note, the ‘Resolves’ are far weaker, and far less instructive for NUS taking a hard and public line on this matter.

Edmund Schluessel’s further amendment reflect the Socialist Party’s euro-sceptical position, which led to their previous involvement in the ‘No2EU‘ party (later merging into TUSC) in recent years). Whilst I can support parts of this amendment which expand on the impact of right wing xenphobia, I think it is uneccessarily anti-EU. Whilst the EU is, of course, a capitalist – a ‘bosses’ institution, the amendment makes little comment on the opportunities it brings for pan-European organising against European employment law (for example).

Replace NEC Believes 2 with: 2. There has been a rise in support for UKIP. Rather than try to counter the conditions which fertilise the ground in which UKIP grows, both the government and the Labour opposition have pandered to and fanned the flames of xenophobia
Replace NEC Believes 3 with: 3. That the rise in right-wing, nationalist agitation is resulting in such things as a major increase in racist bullying in schools (source: ChildLine) as well as incidents of violence against international students.
Add NEC Believes 4. The European Union has contributed to conditions fuelling this hate, for example through imposing devastating austerity on Greece which has opened the space for the rise of the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn.
Add NEC Believes 5. Supposed ‘free movement of labour’ in the EU is rigged in favour of employers, with EU rules contradicting the principle of equal pay for equal work, member states allowed to discriminate against migrant workers, and many members including the UK making heavy use of opt-outs from EU protections on working rights.
Replace NEC Resolves 1 with: 1. That ‘strain’ on jobs and services is a result of the government’s cuts which seek to boost profits and the wealth of the rich at the expense of all workers. NUS will issue a statement condemning racism in all its forms and arguing for a united fight of workers and students from all backgrounds to oppose austerity and fight for adequate provision of jobs, homes and services.
Replace NEC Resolves 2 with: 2. That this statement should also condemn UKIP and support the unity and solidarity of working class people across Europe, in opposition to the bosses’ EU. The statement should support a united struggle of all European workers against brutal (and often EU enforced) austerity as part of a programme of internationalism, fighting for the liberation of the oppressed, the levelling up conditions and greater democracy worldwide.
Add new NEC Resolves: To support trade unions organising to end the super-exploitation of migrant labour and fight for a living-wage for all workers.
Add new NEC Resolves: To oppose discriminatory rules which guarantee unequal access to benefits, state support and the NHS in the UK

The following motion is a simple one calling for NUS backing to the ongoing ‘3 Cosas‘ dispute at the University of London, which recently won significant concessions in a strike, and hopes to win its full set of demands with its upcoming days of action. The campaign is extremely significant for the UK labour movement, in that it is made up of traditionally unorganised workers. It is particularly important that NUS backs this, as they are workers at the University of London, and it will send a clear message to UoL management that NUS backs the campaign, alongside the trade union (IWGB) and student union (ULU). It has become apparent over recent months that the Vice President Union Development, Raechel Mattey, has been meeting UoL management in private regarding the ‘pan-london representation’ issue where ULU is threatened with closure, in what seems to be an attempt to undermine ULU’s future existence. If NUS backs this workers’ campaign, which it should, it should also immediately cease discussions with UoL management who have brutally attacked students and workers (through police intimidation and arrests as well as refusal to meet with IWGB) as part of their attempt to undermine the 3 Cosas dispute.

3 Cosas campaign

NEC Resolves:
1. To support the ongoing “3 Cosas” campaign by outsourced University of London workers, and advertise and promote it widely.
2. To ask the VP Society & Citizenship to meet representatives of the campaign to discuss working together.
3. To mobilise Constituent Members for the 27-29 January strike.
4. To donate £400 to the strike fund

That’s all for now, I’ll publish my thoughts on motions 4-9 later in the week. At present I’m in discussions with NUS about the legality of an amendment I wrote about the Mark Duggan inquest, calling for full support for calls for justice. After some comments from the NUS legal department, I will be resubmitting the amendment to be heard by NUS NEC, and will publish as soon as I hear back.

Rosie

Why did NUS executive vote down an anti-racism motion?

At the NUS National Executive Council meeting on 8 May, a motion on fighting racism and fascism was voted down, by 8 votes to 11.

The motion was a composite of NUS Black Students’ Campaign text (written by the Student Broad Left group) and text from NCAFC supporters about traveller/Roma solidarity – with an additional NCAFC amendment making the whole thing far more substantial and radical (see below for all the text). The amendment was passed by one vote before the whole motion was defeated.

At NUS conference in April, NUS Black Students’ Officer Aaron Kiely had made a big effort to have the motion discussed by pushing it up the agenda, but was opposed by the NUS leadership. NUS President Liam Burns said that he did not want the motion moved out of the Society & Citizenship ‘Zone’ to Welfare (where it had originally been submitted), but that he would be happy to see it prioritised once the Welfare debate began. When this move was made, however, he joined – or led – those voting against.

At no point did Burns and co. say they were against the motion itself. Yet when it came to the NEC, they voted it down. Why?

The justification was that the motion advocates working with Unite Against Fascism, whose leading officers include Martin Smith, a Socialist Workers Party leader accused of rape.

As I have said many times, the SWP’s handling of the Martin Smith case is a major issue, and indicative of much wider and deeper problems in their organisation and on the left.

Moreover, UAF is a deeply problematic organisation. Wanting to militantly fight racism and fascism does not mean supporting UAF. On the contrary, it necessitates criticising it. Workers’ Liberty has been making this point for some time, long before versions of it became widespread (see ‘Why we voted against support for UAF’, from NUS conference 2011).

It’s a shame that the SWP and SBL put support for this crappy organisation (and defending Martin Smith) before actually fighting racism and fascism.

Having said that, the NUS leadership’s vote was both cynical and wrong. I believe that some of those who voted against the motion did so in good faith, on what they felt were principled feminist grounds, but it was cynical and irresponsible of the leading faction not to outline what I am outlining here, because those concerns were – on balance – not a reason to vote against the motion. I believe supporting the motion as a whole does not make me any less of a principled feminist, nor does it undermine the actions taken by the women on the NEC last year over rape apologism. I believe there were people in the room with speaking rights who would have been able to represent this position quite clearly, but the fact that they did not led several people to feel unnecessarily uncomfortable (and therefore vote against), and I believe this was a matter of factional manoeuvring.

It was cynical because of the way they manoeuvred the motion away from open debate in a public forum so they could quietly vote it down in the NEC.

Cynical because the Blairites who run NUS are happy to make all kinds of alliances and deals with all kinds of people – including not saying a word about reactionary, misogynistic, homophobic figures in UAF for years – but have now seized on the (real) issue of Martin Smith for factional reasons.

And wrong because it shows a complete lack of concern to fight racism and fascism.

Several women on the NEC felt that in the aftermath to this motion at the NEC they were misrepresented as ‘racists and fascists’ by SBL members on Twitter and Facebook, and then on their website, for voting against the motion due to concerns about UAF. This was wrong, and a disgusting way to speak about people, several of whom had genuine concerns about the implications of supporting such a motion. It is legitimate to have feminist concerns and criticisms about UAF, just as it is legitimate to have many other concerns and criticisms of that organisation. But the NUS leadership’s previous record and what the motion said (it didn’t say NUS should put Martin Smith on its platforms!) and the dynamics of the situation meant that voting against the motion did not follow.

Whether or not the NEC passes this or that particular text probably doesn’t make much difference. But not submitting any anti-racism text to conference themselves, manoeuvring the only anti-racism motion off the conference agenda and then voting it down later says a lot about the leadership’s attitude to actually fighting racism.

At a time when the far right is burgeoning across Europe, and when there is a surge of racism and nationalism in Britain (UKIP!), anti-racism should be a top priority for NUS. But the NUS leadership don’t want to fight on this any more than they want to fight on anything else – be it tuition fees, or housing, or abortion rights. (Their promotion of the Tory Peter Smallwood to the NEC shows that these Labour Party careerists don’t even want to fight the Tories as a party.)

I’m against affiliating to UAF. But the idea that we shouldn’t work with them in the fight against racism and fascism is simply sectarian. Does that mean NUS will be boycotting demonstrations called by UAF?

NCAFC members Michael Chessum and Roshni Joshi voted for the motion, and if we’d had votes our larger number of new NEC members would have voted for it too. We took this stance while maintaining our criticisms, and while promoting our more radical amendment (no doubt Burns and co. were happy to vote down text criticising the Labour Party too).

As a member of a political group that has taken a lot of stick for criticising UAF – and is proud to have done so – I think the NUS leadership’s attitude stinks.

***

Motion 416 (voted down 8-11, with 4 abstentions)
[The sections from traveller/Roma rights were submitted by written by NCAFC supporters and submitted by Royal Holloway SU; the rest is from NUS Black Students’ Committee]

Conference Believes:
1. Far right mobilisations, such as those of the English Defence League’s (EDL) and the British National Party (BNP) are a threat to society.
2. It is a national priority for the student movement to stop fascists from winning MEP seats by mobilising the progressive majority to vote.
3. The student movement must never give a platform to fascists because fascism seeks to eliminate free speech and democracy, and annihilate its opponents and minorities.
4. Giving fascists a platform in the student movement destroys the safe spaces our campuses must be for Black, Jewish, Muslim, women, LGBT and disabled people.
5. Racism is a scourge in society, including on campuses, that needs to be opposed.
6. The far right mobilisations, such as the fascist English Defence League’s (EDL) violent protests and the fascist British National Party (BNP) are a threat to society.
7. Discrimination and harassment of Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities – among the most marginalised minorities in the UK – is considered an “acceptable” form of racism.
8. The violent eviction of 83 families from Dale Farm, which was home to almost 1,000 people for more than 30 years. This cost Basildon council £7 million!
9. More than 90% of Travellers planning applications are initially rejected by local government authorities, compared to 20% overall.
10. Basildon council recently voted to take ‘direct action’ against families living at the roadside near Dale Farm.

Conference Further Believes:
1. NUS must actively campaign against racism, Islamophobia, anti-Semitism and the far right as these are dangers which threaten the welfare of millions of our members.
2. The BNP is a fascist organisation which stands for an “all white Britain”, a goal which can only be achieved by violence, the annihilation of entire groups of people and the ending of democracy.
3. BNP leader Nick Griffin and fascist Andrew Brons are standing for re-election to the European Parliament in 2014. It’s a national priority for the student movement to stop fascists from winning MEP seats by mobilising the progressive majority to vote.
4. The student movement must never give a platform to fascists because fascism seeks to eliminate free speech, democracy and annihilate its opponents and minorities.
5. The lesson of the 1930s was that the Nazis used violence to gain power and carry out a Holocaust. They slaughtered millions – in the gas chambers and concentration camps – of Jewish people, Eastern Europeans, communists and trade unionists, Romani, LGBT and disabled people.
6. Giving fascists a platform in the student movement destroys the safe spaces our campuses must be for Black, Jewish, Muslim, women, LGBT and disabled people.
7. The racism and disadvantage experienced by Roma and Traveller is a disgrace.
8. The eviction of Traveller sites is a form of discrimination which results in people being forced onto the road against their will and children being pulled out of education.

Conference Resolves:
1. To actively challenge racism, Islamophobia, anti-Semitism and fascism on our campuses and in our communities.
2. To campaign for no platform for fascists within NUS or in our Students’ Unions.
3. Launch a massive student voter registration drive as part of campaign to get Griffin and Brons out of the European Parliament in 2014.
4. Reaffirm our support for NUS organising an annual Anti-Racism/Anti-Fascism Conference and providing adequate resources for this work.
5. Continue working with Unite Against Fascism, Searchlight, One Society Many Cultures and Love Music Hate Racism.
6. To work with self-organised Gypsy, Roma and Traveller groups, as well as the Traveller Solidarity

Amendment 416a (passed and incorporated into motion before it was voted down)
[Written by NCAFC supporters, submitted by Royal Holloway SU and Birmingham Guild]

Conference Believes:
1. While the BNP and EDL are in disarray, the far right remains a serious threat, taking inspiration from the Front National in France and the rise of Golden Dawn in Greece.

Conference Further Believes:
1. Conditions feeding the far right include:
a. Widespread racism, encouraged by a government and press promoting the idea that immigration is a major cause of social problems;
b. Huge cuts and perceptions of a struggle for scarce resources, which the far right actively exploits;
c. A Labour Party failing to challenge the Conservatives’ narrative;
d. A labour movement failing to challenge the Tories.

2. We need an anti-fascist movement which:
a. Is genuinely democratic, allowing activists to debate the way forward;
b. Challenges all racism, including Islamophobia and anti-semitism, and campaigns for migrants’ rights;
c. Mobilises to drive fascists off the streets, instead of calling for state bans;
d. Unites workers and communities for demands to undercut the demagogy of the far right: black and white, all religions and none, British-born and migrant – unite and fight for jobs, homes and services for all.

Conference Resolves:
1. To produce campaigning materials based on these ideas, and fight for them in any anti-fascist campaign we support.