[4] By 1904 Fenwick and Isla Stewart had managed to create the Provisional Committee of the National Council of Nurses of Great Britain and Ireland (NCN).

This enabled the National Council of Nurses to affiliate to the ICN at its second international congress in Berlin.

[6] A meeting of the Provisional Committee on 31 January 1908, held in London, voted to agree to the creation and constitution of the National Council of Nurses of Great Britain.

[9] In response, the Association continued to dominate decision-making in the National Council of Nurses throughout this period, in particular by restricting the College to eight delegates so that they could be outvoted easily.

[5] After the Second World War the National Council of Nurses sought to revise its constitution and increase its fees, but caused controversy by not consulting its membership adequately.

[10] Concerns were raised that individual nurses were represented by more than one association, duplicating effort and costs.

[5] In 1949 one of the Royal College of Nursing sub-committees voted to withdraw from membership of the National Council of Nurses and, although the College's main Council agreed to postpone action and instead pursue reconciliation, little progress was made.

They led a joint meeting in 1958 which agreed the principal of a unified professional body under a royal charter.