Chris Luck

Chris Luck is the SU's Democracy Officer.

Union Council meeting 4 - what happened?

Posted on Tue 17 Jan 2012 at 12:00 by Christopher Luck

Council meeting number 4 – what a meeting that was! If I were to try and summarise it succinctly I think I’d go with – significant, long and exciting (I know, I know – I’m a democracy geek…).

I haven’t got long (workload just exploded) so apologies that this summary is a bit rushed:

Sabbatical Officer Role Changes

To be short – the proposal passed! The Sabb Roles going forwards to the Officer Elections 2012 are:

President

Education

Democracy & Development

Welfare & Campaigns

Postgraduate

Societies

Sports

The inclusion of a PG Officer is a big change in the Union and we hope a welcome one. Full job descriptions and details of the elections process will go live soon at our rather snazzy looking elections website…

Part-Time Officer Role Changes

Again I’m pleased to say that the proposal passed. This was phase one of the Democracy Review that the Democracy Review Working Group has been working on for a couple of months and is part of our move to make Union Democracy more simple, relevant and accessible.

The roles up for election are:

UG Arts

UG Social Sciences

UG Engineering and Experimental Sciences

UG Physics and Formal Sciences

Women’s Officer

Disabled Students Officer

LGBTUA+ Officer

Ethnic Minorities Officer

Again, watch out for job descriptions shortly…

Proxy Voting

Our proposal here was about fixing what people weren’t happy about last time – the basics are that proxy votes now have to be submitted by the person who is giving their vote as opposed to the person who would hold it. The amendments to the form that needs filling in removes (hopefully) the controversy from last time.

Living Wage

Here a proposed amendment was defeated. Following a lot of discussion and a presentation on the Union’s finances it became clear that while the Union is still mandated to work towards the living wage (as outlined in Policy 712), it is simply not possible for that implementation to happen this year.

New policy: National Representation of UA+ Students

An uncontroversial policy, this mandates the delegates to NUS LGBT Conferences ‘to vote in favour of motions designed to include students who identify as asexual, queer, or other marginalised romantic/sexual orientations or gender identities’

New policy: Boycott Eden Springs

Here a motion passed to campaign for the University to cancel its contract with Eden Springs UK, Ltd. (a company which supplies water for water coolers). I’ll post a link to the full motion when I can…

They’re your highlights – full minutes will be up over the next few days so watch this space.

So, what’s next in the world of your Democracy Officer?

General Meeting – deadline for the submission of motions is Monday 23^rd 4pm
Democracy Review phase 2 – looking at structure and decision-making process, how can we make Union Democracy more simple, accessible and relevant?
Officer Elections 2012 – this big one. Who will run? Who will you vote for? Why does it all matter?

Exciting times ahead!

Comments

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George Whitworth: 5:24pm on 2 Feb 12 Sorry if my comment below sounded at all patronising by the way, it really wasn't meant to! I think your list is correct, yeah. Perhaps Chris Luck could compile the list on a section of the democracy pages (although it may already exist and I just don't know it!)
Scott Whiteside: 9:22pm on 1 Feb 12 Hi George, since having to resort to checking every single policy title in detail and then checking the appropriate documents' contents was somewhat dull, I've made a little list of the results for anyone else who happens to be interested. For the record, then, we're currently boycotting: * Nestlé * Eden Springs * All arms companies * All tobacco companies * All oil companies * All non-Fairtrade companies (for purchases of coffee, tea, specialty tea, hot chocolate and sugar) ...with an option on boycotting Bacardi in this meeting. That's the lot, right?
George Whitworth: 4:11pm on 1 Feb 12 Hi Scott, All current policy is available on the website: http://www.warwicksu.com/democracy/policy/ It's usually fairly obvious from the name of a policy if it involves a ban/boycott.
Scott Whiteside: 6:12pm on 31 Jan 12 Is there a list anywhere of all the companies and sectors we're currently boycotting? There's a few banned sponsors mentioned on a wall in SUHQ, but beyond that, I'm losing track.
Oliver Holmes: 8:36pm on 18 Jan 12 I'm sure someone on the council has a fetish for boycotts. Hopefully there is no more false terrorism accusations running about again.