Petition against Pro-life society affiliation gets 17,000 signatures

17,000 people have signed a petition calling for Notts SU to strip the controversial Pro-life society of affiliation.

Vinnie Fraser, a third year law student, created the petition after Nottingham SU granted affiliation to the controversial Nottingham Students for Life yesterday

However, the petition has been temporarily shut down due to spamming, with those against the society's affiliation arguing it was an attack aiming to discredit the petition. A new petition has been started as a result.

The petition has stated "NOTE: This is NOT politically driven, this is simply to protect students interests, and show the SU that it must respect the democratic procedures laid out it in its bye laws."

The petition's creator told The Nottingham Tab he set it up to try and defend the democracy of the SU. "We set-up the petition because we think that the Students' Union going against a democratic vote of the Societies Council is wrong," said Vinnie.

"Every student group has passed through this way, and no group should be allowed to be affiliated without due process in accordance with bye laws. We are hoping that the SU will listen to our concerns and run a final, unfettered affiliation vote to cement the groups position in the future of the Union.

"The original petition was spam-botted by somebody who thought it appropriate to make disgusting remarks on the signature names to discredit the petition, and censor our cause."

Nottingham Students for Life responded to the petition, telling The Nottingham Tab: "We're unsurprised to see a petition, but I feel the university did what was right and just – they realised the way they had addressed our attempt to affiliate was wrong and acted on that.

"While numerous voices can try to tell the university that their decision to affiliate us was unfair, it doesn't change the legal obligation they had to not discriminate against us for our belief that life begins at conception."