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UGM fails SU to implement four-year plan for services to reach quorum by Katie Hughes · News Editor
by Jon Hozier-Byrne · Editor
The first UCD Students’ Union General Meeting to be held in twenty-four years, which took place on February 6th in the Astra Hall, failed to reach quorum. The assembly, which was called to decide the motion ‘Should the Union General Meeting overturn the decision by the Union to close the Print Bureau (SU General Office) in the Library/Arts Tunnel?’, was open to all members of the Students’ Union, and required five per cent of the student body (approximately 1,000 students) to vote in order to be constitutionally binding. The Meeting achieved a total of 157 votes, 156 of which were valid, leaving the Meeting over 800 votes short of achieving quorum. The total cost of the Meeting, including twelve staff members and the printing of ballot papers, is estimated to have come to over €3,000. Of the votes cast, eighty-seven voted in proposition of the motion, while sixty-nine voted in opposition. As such, the Returning Officer Morgan Shelley announced that the motion was inquorate, and therefore invalid. Less than one per cent of the student body partook in the vote. Regarding the low turnout for the vote, the final speaker for the Proposition, Elizabeth Coote commented, “I’m disappointed on that, because let’s be honest, 23,000 students – how many actually elect the Students’ Union? Very few students within the college go for election. We got 3,000 [signatures] in seven to eight days.” UCD SU President Pat de Brún commented, “Reaching quorum was extremely unlikely. I think that was clear for everyone from the start, including the proposer, with the full knowledge of what the cost would be to the Union, so to be honest, I think the end result is quite counter-productive compared to what the intended result behind the petition was.” The first speaker for the Opposition, UCD SU Campaigns and Communications Officer Brendan Lacey stated his concern about the cost of the event, remarking, “No democratic process of the Union could be considered a waste of money, but it’s unfortunate that in a year where we’ve endeavoured to make huge savings across the board … to see it struck out with what turned
Electoral hopefuls James Atkinson, Sam Geoghegan, Patrick Wolohan, Enda Conway, Rachel Breslin, Paddy Guiney, Shane Comer, Aisling Sheerin, Karl Gill, Mícheál Gallagher and Eoin Heffernan line up for their first photograph as Students’ Union Sabbatical candidates. The elections will take place alongside the Constitutional Referendum on February 29th and March 1st. Photographer: Jon Hozier-Byrne
out be a measure that wasn’t promoted well, and really won’t have any binding effect on the Union… I’m disappointed.” When asked whether this result would end the campaign to overturn the decision made by the SU, the proposer of the motion, Karl Gill stated, “We’ll have to stick our heads together, but chances are, if the two women [Jacqueline Carey and Anne Dunne, both made redundant before Christmas] aren’t willing to do much more after this then we will have to call it a day, if that’s the case. However, I still think the campaign proved a lot of reasonable points, that there is a frivolous attitude when it comes to finances in the Union, that there is a tendency towards Ents and less of a tendency towards educational services. I think, if we get anything out of it, it’s that student activism is still alive and is still fighting
for the genuine, real things that are on students’ minds today.” Concerns were raised as to why profits from the Student Travel Card (STC) were not included in the accounts of the Copy Bureau; de Brún explained that the STC account was a transferable one, meaning it was not a “key tenant” of the printing bureau and hence could be moved to a different outlet on campus. In addition, a large amount of STCs were sold in the first few of weeks of term, when stands were set up in the Arts Block and Student Centre, and not in the Copy Bureau. The printing machines used in the Copy Bureau were operating under a lease and are expected to be returned shortly. De Brún votes in the UGM Photographer: David Nowak
Counselling waiting list to be reduced through use of external service by Katie Hughes · News Editor
Students’ Union President Pat de Brún has confirmed that the Union will be seeking to reduce the eight-week waiting list for the Counselling Service by referring students to an outside practice, the costs of which will be covered by funds obtained from the University. De Brún expressed concern for students currently on the waiting list, “it is a very serious situation because obviously some of the people on that list might be at serious risk,” which was
his motivation for putting a proposal before the relevant University committee. However, de Brún recognised that the solution was not a permanent one, “it’s a temporary solution but a good solution.” The service will remain free of charge to students, as an “agreement in principle” has been established with the University to provide additional funds to cover the visits. De Brún believes this to be “fantastic because it’s one of the most crucial areas that we really need to look at.”
According to de Brún, the money will be coming “essentially from the Vice-President for Students’ budget,” which is allocated by the Student Experience Management Executive Committee. He explained that with the Community Musical no longer taking place this year, “there was a little bit of additional money, which would normally go as a contribution to that, so that money is being targeted and which has, in principle, been made available.” Students’ Union Welfare Officer, Rachel Breslin, has met with MyMind, a
clinic in Ranelagh, to whom students from the waiting list may be referred. Breslin explained that students on the waiting list will be given a code or a voucher for an outside counselling service. Representatives from the Community Musical stated that they were in no position to confirm or deny whether the funds allocated for the initiative would come from their own budget, “realistically, you don’t know what budgets are available from year to year, but I’m sure that some of this year’s money will certainly be available.”
As a part of becoming UCDSU Ltd, the Students’ Union is implementing a four-year plan for their services, focusing mainly on the various SU shops located across campus. SU President Pat de Brún stated that the plan was to be implemented due to the election of new SU Officers every year not equating to “anything commercial”, as long-term planning and management is required. The SU shops will be the main focus of the plan, “we will draw up a plan of where we want to get to in terms of targets, what we want to be supplying, what each shop will look like. It might involve a capital investment of changing the look of the shops, changing the focus of the shops and making sure that they’re performing to the best of their abilities.” No definite changes have been decided upon yet, but according to de Brún, external retail experts have been offering recommendations so “we’re taking that on board.” Installing delis in the shops and supplying more groceries are ideas the SU is looking at implementing, “We’re trying to find out what the market is and what exactly we should be providing so that over the course of the next number of years we’re providing the best possible service to students, but at the same time we’re being a sustainable service with reasonable margins for the Union.” De Brún does not see foresee any of the shops closing or further redundancies being made, “but nothing can be ruled out, the state of our services wing, the way it was left – there is large change necessary, very comprehensive change across the board. Some of [the changes] will be fantastic and some of them will be more difficult. We don’t know exactly where we are quite yet in terms of those plans.” De Brún has also put forward a proposal to both the Forum Club Committee and the Student Club Committee that the student bars should be incorporated as companies, “I’m in favour of the bars incorporating as companies, not under the Union control.” This proposal has been met with some resistance from the respective committees. De Brún stated that he understood why resistance would be encountered, “some people would not want to do that because … it would involve those people on the committees being directors and there are certain owner’s responsibilities involved, so I can understand people’s opposition.” De Brún maintained that the move would provide a more sustainable, proper structure for the bars. His main reason for the proposal was the obligation to produce accounts every year, “it’s a legal obligation as opposed to what it is currently – yes it’s in the Bar Constitution but it doesn’t have legal standing whereas this would … I think [this would help us] to learn from the mistakes of the last few years.” A Student Club Committee meeting due to take place yesterday was to focus on the financial status of the Student Club, according to de Brún, “the accounts are nearly formalised, we asked for some baseline P and L, profit loss figures, so we should see exactly how much the bar is making or losing. Hopefully, that’s what we requested, so I’m hopeful we’ll get to see that.” The establishing of UCDSU Ltd is nearly complete and is to be finalised in the next couple of weeks. According to de Brún, “it’s not something that really needs to be rushed, it’s just something I’d like to get done before the end of term.”