Students could lose congress vote

Thousands of nursing students could be deprived of their influence at RCN Congress in plans put to the organisation's council.

Ben Mott, RCN student member of council, criticised the draft plans  in a review of the congress voting system at a meeting earlier this month. The plans contain two options for calculating votes at congress designed to make it more representative of the membership at large.

Mr Mott said: 'This deprives 34,000 student members of their vote at congress.' He added that students would be reduced to a watching and listening role which would prevent them from exercising any influence on congress decisions.

'When you take votes away from the student group at congress you start to demoralise the Association of Nursing Students. I can't believe such an oversight is allowed to get through to the final version of the report,' he said.