barefacts | 27 February 2003
10 | ElectionSpecial
Yes
on-line voting at www.ussu.co.uk
Free NUS Cards, Cheap Beer, The
Fight against Fees…and when you
add up the savings we get on bars
and ents, it works out virtually
free…but there are much better
reasons for us to stay strong and
stay in NUS.
Our council tax exemption, our
Stella discounts, and the fight
against fees are all thanks to NUS.
Big or small, when students or
Unions have a problem the strength
of NUS helps.
It would be naïve to think that a
group of people could set up and
maintain a student’s union, with
all the commercial elements, plus a
developing welfare unit and a strong
Skills and Volunteering programme,
without loads of support, training
and information. I’m talking about
Surrey specifically- so much of what
we do is adapted from the copious
amounts of role-specific training
offered free throughout the year for
staff and sabbaticals.
Without the National Student
• When you add up the benefits and
discounts we get as part of NUS
Ents and NUS Services, affiliation
is free;
• National representation for
students in the fight for grants not
fees and winning back the grant;
• Winning 100% exemption
from the council tax since 1992
worth £630,000 a year to Surrey
university students;
• Forcing the EU to abandon
proposals which would have made
it impossible for students’ unions to
run minibuses;
• Securing the continued existence
of the young persons railcard
after the railways act threatened its
existence;
• Overturning government
proposals to wreck students’
Should USSU remain affiliated to NUS?
TONI BORNEO
Learning Programme (an NUS
initiative), USSU couldn’t have
launched and sustained the
successful DAVE peer to peer
training in just a couple of months.
Even the V Volunteering programme
had to draw on resources from
somewhere. It makes sense to pool
knowledge and make it available
from a central resource. NUS has the
full time staff carrying out research,
training, publications and briefings
that individual unions could never
hope to disseminate effectively
between themselves. It’s a giant
unions with all but one of NUS’
recommendations accepted in the
final legislation;
• Winning the fight for fair and
accessible complaints procedures
in Universities
• Raising awareness on gas safety
and winning new legislation
on Housing Safety and Dodgy
Landlords;
• Campaigning successfully for
increases in hardship funds;
• Getting the views of students in
the national papers day in day out;
• Providing training, briefings,
research, advice, publications,
and legal support for your union’s
officers as they need it;
• Pressurising the scottish
parliament, welsh assembly and
network – and it’s true what they
say about strength in numbers.
We are to the NUS what this union
is to Surrey students. We implore
students to come to council to hold
us accountable and mandate us
to work on their behalf (or what’s
the point?). We tell them what we
don’t like about the student world,
and they have to do their utmost
to make it better. Take student
funding, or Wednesday afternoons,
or privatisation of halls….you name
it. If it’s your problem, we can look
to them to fight the corner.
I’m not saying the NUS is perfect
– there are cracks in the structure.
But I wholeheartedly believe that
we must use our vote to reform the
organisation. We’d gain nothing by
going solo – and don’t forget we’d
lose our students discounts and
NUS Entertainments (e.g. Orange
Tours). Don’t think we could save
the £33k is costs to affiliate either
– the University pays for it so it’s not
ours to save!
uk government to review student
funding;
• Your NUS card is proof of a
reciprocal agreement allowing you
and your mates to go to each others’
Union clubs;
• Last year, USSU enjoyed £50k’s
worth of free NUS Entertainments,
including the Orange Tour, and the
PlayStation 2 network;
• Provides advice and guidance on
the law relating to student union
and charitable law issues;
• Thousands of discounts for
students online and in many high
street retailers and loads of other
stuff we haven’t got room to
mention...
• 98% of Students’ Unions can’t
be wrong: Stay Strong and vote
YES to NUS
 barefacts | 27 February 2003

ElectionSpecial | 11

Should USSU remain affiliated to NUS?

Rather than simply state the
rationale for why USSU should
not be affiliated with the NUS, I
will instead annotate the probable
offered reasons why we should
remain affiliated with counter
arguments:
“If USSU disaffiliates then you
will lose your student discount in
high street stores”
Years ago this may have been the
case, however with increasing
competition from the likes of Virgin
Student, the NUS card is no longer
the bastion of student discount it
once was. With the introduction
of ‘discount’ cards this year not
only did retailers gain more ways of
tracking individual student spending
habits but it forced students to
register with the nusonline website
in a thinly veiled effort to add value
to the marketing deal NUS had with
ITM.
NUS have lost sight of the students
they supposedly represent when
they make discount agreements with
retailers like Habitat; just how many
students shop there regularly? At the
regional conference NUS treasurer
announced that NUS were looking
at potential new opportunities; these
opportunities, and I quote, were
“credit cards, mobile phones and
banks” - all of which do nothing for
the majority of students attempting
to avoid debt by saving money on
required basics.
PAUL WRIGHT
“Without affiliation sabbatical
officers will miss out on valuable
NUS training”
Although it is true that disaffiliation
would mean missing out on NUS
training it does not mean that
officers would receive no training
whatsoever. With the successful
launch of the DAVE project this year
we have a proven training system
that could be used with future
sabbatical teams. Add to that fact
that two members of staff involved
in the DAVE project are former
sabbaticals officers themselves; it
is easy to see that we could cover
most of the training requirements in
house. External training companies
would cover the remainder of the
training requirements.
“NUS campaigns get the message
across nationally”
This may be true but consider the
mixed messages given out. On the
one hand we had one of the most
No
ineffective campaigns in the form of
the “If you do drink, don’t do drunk”
to the more recent, stereotyping
‘Kebabathon’ game, in which you
play the part of a drunken student
trying to break into his own house.
Consider also that of the £4million
NUS spends annually only £95,000 is
spent on priority campaigns; unlike
individual Unions the NUS has no
societies or sport clubs to support.
Compare this to the £282,200
spent on annual conference or the
£667,850 spent on maintaining
prestigious headquarters in Central
London for purely historical reasons
and you can see how little directly
gets to student causes.
“NUS will listen to student
issues”
I expect we will see at least one NUS
officer actively campaigning for the
‘yes’ vote in the next couple of weeks.
No doubt they’ll claim that they are
only too happy to listen to students
and their issues but ask yourself
this: when was the last time that an
NUS officer visited USSU? Last year
was the first occasion since I have
been here with the rent protest and
the nationwide publicity it attracted.
Before that it was six years ago
during a strong ‘No’ campaign. Bear
in mind also that most of the NEC
are standing for re-election this year
and want as big a personal profile as
possible.

NUS affiliation currently costs
£33,000 a year. This money comes
through the subvention from the
University and is budgeted for
year on year. The Union would not
automatically receive this money if it
was to disaffiliate but a sound case
could be put to the University for
this money to directly benefit Surrey
students. Just think what an extra
£33,000 a year would mean to the
societies, sport clubs and services
the Union currently offers.
As a member of NUS the Union
is also a member of their buying
consortium, NUSSL. The terms
and conditions of this membership NUS card has meant that we have
stipulate that we have to sell certain been forced to expend extra effort
“must stock” products and give in issuing the card to students
them favourable profile on the bars. and answering queries relating to
The ratio of beer pumps is also laid registering on the nusonline website.
down such that two Stella pumps The introduction of a separate card
must be accompanied with one has lead to confusion with not only
Carling and one Grolsch pump. the student population but also
These restrictions limit what offers retail shops that are not highlighted
and products we can offer students, in NUS marketing. The company
in fact until last summer we were behind the card, ITM, fell into
not allowed to serve Stella as it was receivership earlier this year leaving
not an “approved product” in the NUS roughly £480,000 short of
eyes of NUSSL. income and leaving member Unions
The introduction of a new discount £75,000 short when combined
card for Unions that issue their own together.
www.no2nus.co.uk | http://union.ic.ac.uk/campaigns/nus/no2nus/

on-line voting at www.ussu.co.uk