DSB: Increasing member participation in conference

Transcription

1 Division Secretaries Briefing 2013 Annual Conference arrangements DSB: Increasing member participation in conference The Conference Memorandum adopted at the 2012 Conference in Torquay included a range of measures designed to increase member participation and improve business arrangements by ensuring: more equal gender balance for speakers; less repetition of debates; longer deadlines giving associations more time to consider business Equality monitoring The equalities monitoring of Conference delegates has been an on-going activity for several years. As the policy-making forum of the Union, it should reflect the diversity of our members. The data collected provides an equalities profile of members actively involved in the Union. Changes in the profile of delegates, demonstrates the impact of efforts to make Conference more representative of the membership. In 2009 the monitoring form was attached to the CBC ballot paper as a means of increasing the number of completed forms. This worked initially but has fallen away slightly since then. 625 delegates (56.4%) returned their monitoring forms this year, last year 64.4% were received. In 2013 there were 1107 registered delegates: Graph 1 Age profile of delegates DSB13 WK Annual Conference Arrangements B_NTP 1 30 September 2013

2 This shows how the age profile of delegates has changed over the last 3 years. The data also illustrates that younger delegates are coming to Conference 54% were 55 or under, this figure was 38% in Also, there is a sharp decrease (55%) in delegates of retirement age means younger activists involved. Graph 2 Disabled delegates profile 8% of delegates who answered the question said they were disabled. Of the Union membership for whom there is recorded data, 0.4% state they are disabled. This is substantial under-reporting as it is estimated that, according to the Equality Act 2010 definition of disability there are around 11 million disabled adults in the UK one in five of the adult population. Members may not consider themselves to be disabled despite being covered by the legal definition. More delegates at Conference have identified to the Union that they are disabled than members generally which is encouraging and positive. Graph 3 Sexual orientation of delegates profile This year the number of delegates who said they were lesbian, gay or bisexual was similar to previous years, which is about 6%. DSB13 WK Annual Conference Arrangements B_NTP 2 30 September 2013

3 According to the membership database, 0.5% of members have identified that they are LGB. It is likely that there is under-reporting amongst the membership rather than a disproportionately high number of LGB members at Conference. More delegates identify themselves as LGB at Conference than on the membership form which is encouraging. Graph 4 Ethnic origin of delegates The figures show that the Union needs to motivate black and Asian members to attend Annual Conference; however, the proportion of delegates at Conference is representative of our membership record. This is particularly heartening when the delegates to Conference are considered as a sample of activists. Graph 5 Gender of delegates 49% of delegates were women, 41% were men, 9% did not state their gender on the form. The figures are largely unchanged from the previous 3 years. DSB13 WK Annual Conference Arrangements B_NTP 3 30 September 2013

4 76% of the Union s members are women. The figures therefore demonstrate that far too few women attend Conference. Although only 56% of delegates completed the forms, even if all the other delegates who didn t complete their forms were women, women would still be under-represented at Conference compared to the Union membership nationally, although this is less acute amongst young teachers. Conclusions Encourage delegates to complete the monitoring forms; we need this data for a range of purposes including evaluation of equalities initiatives within the Union. The age profile is changing; there were more under 55s this year with a particularly large increase in the year old bracket. This is great news and a measure of success of the strategy to build a sustainable activist base. Overall in comparison with the membership as a whole, there are still too few women attending Conference. Efforts to attract more young teachers are attracting more young women. The Union needs to adapt to meet the needs of women members and offer modes of participation that are appealing and accessible to all the different groups of women. DSB13 WK Annual Conference Arrangements B_NTP 4 30 September 2013

5 Gender balance of speakers In delegates attended Conference Cards submitted = 497 Total speakers = 103 This chart shows that the changes to standing orders made a significant difference to the gender balance of speakers. Although it created a lot work for the office, it did seem to work. Efforts to monitor the number of times delegates spoke were extremely timeintensive and showed that only 3 delegates reached this point. It has therefore been decided to abandon this element of the changes; the President will ask delegates to exercise self-restraint. Less repetition of debate The CBC was charged with the task of compositing more motions and amendments to reducing the repetition of debates. On the whole the compositing process worked very well with a high degree of consensus amongst divisions and associations for proposed composites. Non-return of responses was treated as affirmation which meant that agreement was 90% for motions and 94% for amendments. DSB13 WK Annual Conference Arrangements B_NTP 5 30 September 2013

6 There was a fairly low return rate on the consultation exercise 47% for motions and 24% for amendments, which perhaps suggests timetabling issues or lack of delegated powers to process the decision. This is a key part of the Agenda process and we want to engage with members on this. Secretaries are encouraged to look at their local rules to see what changes are necessary to allow the Officers or other group to process business of this nature. Deadlines and timetable The primary objective of changing the timetable for Conference business was to give associations and divisions more time for consideration and to make the business timelier, i.e., closer to Conference. Timetable for 2014 and how it differs to 2013 Motions there were no issues with this fixed deadline which will continue next year. Amendments the 3 week deadline was unmanageable and created administrative difficulties. A rule change will be brought to Conference next year to change this deadline to 4 weeks before Conference (to accommodate the consultation period) and for 2014 it is proposed that the consultation period should be reduced from 5 to 3 days to ease the pressure on processing business and accommodating meetings at HQ. Priority Voting in order not to reduce the time for associations to consider amendments to motions, it is also proposed to change the deadline for priority voting to 8 weeks before Conference (rather than 7 at present) to maintain the 4 week gap between the two deadlines. DSB13 WK Annual Conference Arrangements B_NTP 6 30 September 2013