Day one of NatCon: what the hell is a quorum?
The National Union of Students (NUS) has failed to start the National Conference’s (NatCon) agenda, with each faction blaming another for being unable to meet quorum.
The morning began with a Welcome to Country, recognising Ballarat as the traditional Country of the Wadawurrung and Dja Dja Wurrung people. Then, each faction’s delegates went to register and receive their accreditation as normal, but did not return to the conference floor, causing quorum to not be reached.
For NatCon to reach quorum, the floor must have 50% of the votes held by the elected delegates present. The Student Media Association has put out an explainer on how NatCon operates for those who wish to learn more.
Delegates of Unity, National Labor Students (NLS), and Socialist Alternative (Salt) have been confronting each other around the cafeteria over lunch and dinner. This follows the formation of a coalition between Unity and NLS to lock out Salt from executive positions within the NUS.
Despite this, cracks are forming within each faction, with a major split already on the table on day one of NatCon.
Unity, which hasn’t had a faction split in 30 years, has leaked a formal notice to student media that Victorian Unity — a subsection of the faction, holding more votes than any other state — is splitting away from the national Unity body specifically because of conflicts with NSW Unity. According to sources from within Victorian Unity, this is due to “disrespect” towards the headkickers.
The notice said that “Elements of the New South Wales Student Unity leadership have, consistently, departed from convention by utilising proxies from outside Student Unity in internal preselections, including proxies aligned to the Labor Left.”
They’ve noted that the New South Wales branch has been “interfering and seeking to influence the internal matters and preselection of [other] state branches”, and that the NSW caucus leaders have been “approaching delegates from other states who have been formally removed from Student Unity, and attempting to use those individuals to interfere with and weaken the authority of duly constituted state branches.”
Unity operates nationally with branches of their faction within each state and its universities. Each branch has its own leader, all of whom answer to a national convenor, who in this case is Aidan O’Rouke of the New South Wales branch.
As a result of their frustration, Victorian Unity have agreed on a loss of confidence in national convenor Aidan O’Rouke, and resolved to elect a new national convenor. Student media have been tipped off that this may be Neeve Ann Nagle, president of the UTS Student Association in 2026, although this has not been confirmed.
Unfortunately, The Tert reporters were unable to attend the Welcome to Country as we were still stuck on the V-line, which was stationary for nearly an hour during what should have been a 90-minute trip. However, the NUS did treat student media with notably more consideration than in previous years: not only were media registered before delegates, but we were also provided a media room.
We were told that the conference might begin at 8pm, but this didn’t eventuate. For a conference that costs tens of thousands of SSAF dollars to host, it’s a disappointment that the NUS did not manage to begin on the day it was scheduled to. Hopefully the conference will be able to properly kick off tomorrow, and when it does we will be there to keep you updated on all the drama.
