Newcastle students will vote on whether they want to leave the NUS

A petition calling for the Newcastle University Students’ Union to disaffiliate from NUS has reached 300 signatures.

Reaching the magic number of student votes means that Newcastle students will be asked whether they want their Union to disaffiliate from the National Union of Students.

Sabbatical officer, Victoria Armstrong, tweeted she would submit a motion to the Student Council for a referendum, but the petition reached the required about of votes before she needed to.

NUSU normally holds a referendum on the disaffiliation of NUS every three years, and there was due to be one next academic year. But the petition called for that to be brought forward.

Many students and NUSU officials are unhappy with the state of the NUS which follows a national trend.

Petition organiser Matt Wilson-Boddy told The Tab: “The NUS has consistently failed to run effective campaigns to protect students from attacks to our welfare.

“At the most recent conference the NUS voted to criminalise its own members, to waste resources on irrelevant side projects and voted against allowing students direct participation in the organisation’s democratic structure.”

It’s not clear when the cross-campus vote will take place but it could be as early as Monday 9th May. Despite not many students turning up to vote in the sabbatical officer elections, it’s thought this will be a good turnout.

It’s widely thought that Newcastle students will vote to leave the NUS.