Diary of a conference virgin...

With due trepidation Tory Bear printed his e-ticket, packed his pillow and boarded the NUS bus hand in hand with the Labour Student posse. Leaving at midnight and driving the length of the country through the night on a booze free bus was quite the experience. The National Union of Students "safe place" rules were read as we boarded - everyone's opinion had to be respected and no one was allowed to be mean to each other, this apparently meant that a token Tory didn't quite pick up the abuse he might have expected on such an occasion.

Apparently last year's bus ended rather messily so TB's hipflask plan went out the window and it was a very long and sober journey of broken sleep down to Wolverhampton. Arriving on the outskirts of the city as the sun was coming up the very lost bus driver decided to take us on a detour past a 24 hour McDonalds and quite possibly the biggest Dreams bed warehouse ever, neither of which we were allowed to stop at despite the whimpering.

The NUS Scotland crew were the first to arrive and TB had the pleasure of watching as an assorted range of socialists, militants and apparently "right-wing" Labour Students poured into the hall. With all the organisational skills of a party planning company in a brewery things finally got going at around 11.30. Grrrrh. There was a smattering of Tories in attendance, TB counted five, hardly a powerful voting block we could be if CF organised themselves to a greater extent. The morning was spent in a Nuremberg style round of speeches praising the glory of "our union" and poor John Howard was attacked for a good ten minutes by the visiting President of NUS Australia. The fun and games didn't kick off until after lunch...

The vicious debate that has surrounded the Governance Review of the NUS over the last eighteen months was the only item on the agenda. Labour Students and the far left have been arguing over the proposed changes to the constitution for years and literally millions of pounds have been wasted on consultancy fees and special conferences that have seen the new document hammered out. TB couldn't help but feel it was inevitable that this time it would go through as the unions across the country seemed to have done a very good job and stamping out people against the changes from attending this conference. If TB had broken mandate he would have lost his expenses, been made to pay all for all his travel - a pretty good way to make sure the delegation voted in line with union policy. An free trip to Wolverhampton is one thing, being made to pay to go there is quite another...

The usual parade of dyed hair and piercings were on display on the opposing side and the ever smooth Labour students argued this case rather well. The line that really swung it for TB was the fact that the President Wes Streeting told the conference that if the review didn't pass he would go home and shoot himself in the face. The governance review has pretty much been designed to stamp out the ridiculously left wing elements of the NUS that are apparently hampering its progress as a fighting organisation. Although in the short term it seems that power will remain in the hands of Labour, to be honest this is better than some of the nutjob, militant left-wing elements of NUS being anywhere near what could be considered a level of authority.

Though don't get the wrong end of the stick, TB hasn't been swept up in the euphoria and become a fan of the NUS. It wasn't all fun and games. Toward the end of the afternoon an amendment was put forward by UEA - the brainchild of CF member Paul Wells that called for the NUS policy of No-Platform to be removed from the new constitution. No-Platform basically stops the BNP and other extremist organisations from attending conferences or standing in elections. While TB despises extremism on the left and the right it seems ridiculous to force it underground when openly humiliating it in debate would be a far more sensible option. As a Tory TB's feelings toward the NUS and what it stands for went against 98% of the people there but looking around that room there is no point denying that TB saw people who, right or wrong, passionately cared about what they believed in and were willing to fight for those beliefs at every opportunity. Why then are they so scared of debate? They know extremism is wrong, why not defend that view? Running away from extremism and pretending it does not exist will not make it go away. The only way to stamp out the BNP and the Communists (who incidentally are allowed at NUS, funny that,) is to openly fight it and confront it. NUS No-Platform makes a mockery of the entire organisation and undermines any good work that they do.

So the Governance Review passed this time, it still has to be ratified and the organisation is in exactly the same place it was a year ago. It has to go through another one of these glorious Extraordinary Conferences or through the Annual Conference, where it fell last year. The saying goes that any organisation that spends it's time talking about reform, or navel gazing (cough,) is in serious trouble and no truer is this spoken than about NUS. TB can see the logic of Tories opposing the Governance Review as without it the NUS would continue to be the chaotic and weak organisation that it currently is, held to ransom by the far left but at the end of the day it's wasting your money as students and this new constitution will go some way to stop the organisation literally pissing millions of pounds every year up the wall. That is why TB voted for it...

And so back on the bus, 24 hours later to the minute TB arrived back up north. After McDonalds for breakfast and Burger King for supper, along with broken sleep and unhealthy blast of type 1 socialist exposure, TB felt decidedly ill. Not sure whether this will be an experience he is ready to repeat any time soon but worth it to see how the organisation works and where it's problems really lie.

Since the formation of the Student Life committee there has been an internal debate going on within CF about what it's views on NUS should be. If we wanted to, it would not be hard to get forty odd delegates elected around the country to these conferences and actually be a pretty powerful little block... Not all will agree, but for the time being, or at least until the new constitution is ratified TB reckons we should give it the benefit of the doubt and create some mischief. Not long ago a conservative candidate was just one vote off being elected as treasurer and with a little organisation a Tory in one of the top spots is not out of the question. It's a debate that CF needs to have properly, so why not start it here...

What do you all think?