5th Week Trinity 2008 Minutes

 
Council Minutes

5th week tt08

OUSU Council 5th Week Minutes

Elections in Council

Heather Milkiewicz for Graduate Women's Officer

Hannah gave a speech in Heather's place.
She has not been censured, we don't think she has any political affiliations, no weeks absence.

Heather's prepared speech included some past work, in areas such as women and empowerment, development, eating disorders etc. Has been active in WomCam and is the St Anne's MCR Women's Officer. Would like to continue and hopes to coordinate with other OUSU and CR officers.

Tom Haynes for Charities and Community Officer

No political affiliations, no censure, no weeks away.

Keen to ensure links between students and the city. Incredibly clear dialogue between OUSU and community groups, charities and city council. Put money where our mouth is. Fundraising for local charities – massive effort in Michaelmas. Work with other groups. Ambitious but manageable - £75,000-£100,000. Set a target and work 100% for that. Push very hard. Does volunteering. Found that very useful and rewarding.

Reports from Executive

Martin has FOId all college accounts – lots of interesting data. Interviews have been going on for new staff positions.

Ingrid talked about the language policy.

Rich apologised for the lack of his report.

James advertised Target Schools sessions.

SAS Motion

Martin proposed the motion. He observed all the members of the group. Last year the issue first came up and thought about the SAS and the conversation mainly revolved around the VP Women. A referendum on VP Women vs Student Advisor took place. Indicative Poll in Michaelmas didn't provide a strong steer. So Council set up the working group. Martin took us through the five recommendations.
1.    Management Board. Should have a board with a line of responsibility to Council. People with different expertise.
2.    More part-time exec officers. Needs to do more for equal opps.
3.    VP Equal Opportunities – long-term aspiration.
4.    Long-term planning. OUSU suffers from lack of long-term thinking.
5.    2013 review group should happen.

No solution is going to be perfect, this was the best one which could be thought of.

Sam Weeler (LMH): new positions – who's voting for them?
Martin: cross-campus ballots. Self-defining groups? Very hard to distinguish groups. Either a) it would have to be elected in a campaign or b) you would have to flag people – would be impossible. Or self-define on ballot paper, but this could leave to corruption.

Laith Dilaimi (Magd): under Council resolves d) I. ii. Difference in numbers
Martin: Equal Opps officer shouldn't be included – that was struck. 

Alana (St Hilda's): where will you get SAS Board people from?
Martin: Conference panel of college doctors. Currently someone we work with who's a Counsellor and a former management consultatant.

Joel Mullan (St Peter's): what does ultimate jurisdiction mean?
Martin: wording taken what VP Women can already do. And took wording from other student unions. Never been a Council power. It's not sustainable for Council to take charge of welfare.

Katharine Wall: will you streamline schedules other job roles to be a member of the equal opps committee.

John Griffiths (Magd): does this raise question of why men can't vote on women roles?

Jonny Medland (Queen's): SAS management board

Laith: is there a restriction on who can run for those jobs.
Martin: interesting question, not sure what the answer is.

Tom Haynes: voting?
Martin: no way of saying that people who are voting are in those groups.

Jack Matthews (St Peter's): what will happen about complaints on SAS?
Martin: this is being overhauled in policy report, so that'll be dealt with next week.

James Lamming: standing

Second motion:

Only self defined students can run for those roles

Amendments were withdrawn

Another amendment proposed by John Maher:
Any future complaints against the SAS should be handled by the SAS management board.
Accepted as friendly, added as resolves two.

Speech in opposition. None entered, into debate instead.

James Lamming: Supports the recommendations with reservations. Recommendations on management board and five year review should be commended.
Reasons for the report is that the current processes are seen not to be working, five years of the current structure cannot be continued. Extra part time exec positions are helpful, but will not solve the problems.
Current sab workloads are very large. Cannot put welfare and equal opps together, as they are too big.
VP women works on many issues, but are not all women's issues. Things like sexism are not womens issues, but will affect everyone.
What are often seen as womens is often not the case, but are seen as so because they affect more women than men. Things like eating disorders affect men as well as women.
Report is not adequate enough in talking through the other solutions.
Looking forward we have a body of expertise who we should support and trust who have put together this report. With this group, we should look at the job descriptions across the board, and try to ensure that all issues are fully worked out.
We are working piece by piece towards solutions, driving to solve issues. Hopefully in five years time, we won't need equal opps, womens or access reps, we should have

student group should meet one more time to look over job descriptions and

Jaken Henders, New College. Why did VP Graduate withdraw amendment?

Ingrid: Withdrew because they cannot be sorted out practically right now. Has strong reservations:
Just because university data allows us to separate data on students into categories in some respects, doesn't mean that they should be allowed, while other groups still can't.
Doesn't believe that the current sab structure works, and is disappointed it has been kept. Yet group has been as good as it can, and the process was as fair as it was possible. Some propositions, such as the extra part-time execs is commended. Yet VP graduates should not be nominally responsible for international.

Amendment, proposed James Lamming, Seconded Louise Randall.

Add that the review group should meet once more in 7th week in order to look over the job descriptions of the sab structures recommended. Accepted as friendly. Actually not, Hannah Roe speaks in opposition.

James in proposition- we have a body of expertise who can meet and are the right people to look at the issues that still arise.

Hannah- Why was this not done before?
Martin- Not part of the original remit.

Rich Hardiman- If people want questions, they should propose point of information.

Laith Dilami- Is there another review of how people are being electing, and who is electing?
James Lamming; How people are elected isa matter of principle that needs to be discussed.

Amendments added to the motion.

Debate on the motion:

James; Question raised about who should be voting. We should not legislate to say one is gay enough or mature enough to vote for certain positions. Earlier amendment should be considered by council.

Chair; better to discuss these issues at next meeting, when elections are reviewed.

Sumamary; amendments is really good, glad that group can meet again.
We know that this isn't the perfect solution, but we honestly believe that this is the best solution. Going to look at it again at the next meeting, please vote for something that will bring about a change for student welfare for the better.

Motion passed- no speech in opposition

Will come back to termly council for second reading.

Election results:

Graduate women's officer

46 Heather
2 Ron
1 Spoilt

C and Cs

48 Tom
1 Ron

Orientation Motion

Ingrid: At the moment current programme really useful. Part of VP Grad role is to play a part in this. Would be useful for these students to have an orientation at the beginning of the year, so that people will have the opportunity to come together, meet each other and learn things concerning their status and financial situations.
Should be before freshers week, orin 1st or 2nd week, in order to allow people to settle in their colleges.

Friendly amendment passed, that the orientation should not take place in freshers week.

Motion passed without opposition

AOB

Rich- In council is business manager. Council would like to thank him for all that he has done this year and done for OUSU.

Dave- Been a pleasure working for OUSU, been great working with the sabs, who are the best thing about his job.