Adelaide Student Politics

Posted: 10th of September

On the AUU site.
AUU Watch in On Dit (and along with it, this blog) was begun two years ago by Hannah Mattner when she was unable to find out the results of the 2007 election. This year, the results have been prominently displayed on the doors to the Union, and now, online. That's what I call progress.

Definition: In-Camera
Movement into a closed session, where observers are ejected from a meeting, and those present are legally barred from discussing or revealing what took place in the meeting to any not present.

Dearest Board,

I’ve been reporting on you for most of your term. You have collectively done a lot of things in that time, many of which I have written about. One concerns me more than most, as it touches on something which I as a member of student media consider a vital interest. This issue is Board’s going in-camera to discuss constitutional reform.

In a democratic student organization such as Union Board, there are three reasons why you may move in-camera whilst not being actively attempting to subvert transparency. These are

a) Issues dealing with harassment of an individual, where making the issue public may be counterproductive to ensuring their dignity, the protection of which is the whole purpose of bringing the issue to Boards attention
b) Issues where the ability to speak freely without fear of legal reprisal (i.e. charges of defamation) is necessary. This might also include dealing with issues relating to an employee of the AUU.
c) And finally, issues of commercial advantage, where maintaining an open meeting makes the Board unable to adequately advance the objectives of the organization. For example, discussions involving the funding agreement with the university, where the ability of the AUU to bargain with the university is compromised by open meetings.

Anything which directly affects the student population at large must, barring it needing to stay in-camera for legal reasons, be discussed in an open manner. Constitutional reform is something that must be open to student scrutiny and input. I believe the superior morality of keeping such discussion open is obvious to you all, and so will not go into it. Rather, allow me to argue this pragmatically.
By going in-camera, general students are barred from knowing what the significant issues being discussed are. By going in-camera, Board directors are barred from seeking advice and input from the wider student population in any effective way. This affects both the quality of the constitution, as well as your ability to get it passed.

I am not one of those who believe that Board has only gone in-camera this year to discuss constitution. I believe Board members when they say that there were genuine issues of harassment discussed this year which required in-camera protection. That said, every time Board goes in-camera, especially to discuss constitution, that trust is diminished. And I have more trust in the AUU Board than most. When Board goes in-camera to discuss things which should not be in-camera, the whole concept of in-camera is cheapened. This affects your chances for re-election, should you wish to run again. It also affects every Board member in a much more uniform way.

The new AUU Constitution which you are working so hard on needs to be voted on by 10% of students, and 60% of students must vote ‘Yes’ in order to be passed by the student body at the next general elections (See Part 24, AUU Constitution). Keep students locked out of every but the last step of the process of constitutional reform, and your ability to secure a ‘Yes’ vote on this document you have all been haggling over is severely diminished. Those who for one reason or other oppose its being passed will find it easy to attack it not on its content, but on the process in which it came into existence. Students already distrust their elected representatives. It would be very easy to spin a line of alienation of the student body, turning the vote to adopt the new constitution into one about whether or not to reject the legitimacy of the AUU. This is not a battle anyone who cares about the student union at Adelaide should wish to get into.

Compromises will be made with this constitution. No faction will receive 100% of what it wants. This process is the strength of the AUU Board. By keeping it open to scrutiny, you make it possible to explain to students why the final constitution is in the form it is, as opposed to what they may personally prefer. It makes it possible to present the constitution plainly as the result of compromise and agreement by all factions as to the best way for the AUU to move forward into the future. Keep the process secret, and you make it harder to present the constitution as anything but an alien document to students.

Lavinia, I know you have gone to some efforts to try and ensure students have input into this constitution. This is an issue I know you care about. However, as long as the discussions happen in-camera, any efforts you make will not work. Without knowing what the issues and the different positions on them are, general students will not be able to make meaningful contributions to the debate. By discussion of constitution in-camera, Board directors are prevented from discussing these things with students informally, and any formal process to solicit feedback will be unlikely to yield useful suggestions. Furthermore, students have no way to be assured that their input will be considered at all, as it will not be bought up in any democratic forum they can view personally, hear about second-hand, or read about in the pages of On Dit.

To make my point vividly clear to the rest of Board, I give you two examples of affiliates who are currently undergoing constitutional reform, and the pitfalls they have faced when not following the ideal procedure.

Firstly, consider the Clubs Association. Earlier this year, an executive meeting took place in which it was ruled from the Chair to move in-camera for a discussion regarding constitution. When this was discovered at the next council meeting, clubs were aghast. Executive was informed in no uncertain terms that any repeated attempts to move in-camera for discussion of such issues was not okay. The new constitution remains to be put to council at the next meeting, where the lack of initial consultation means it will be treated with more suspicion than it would have otherwise received.

Secondly, the SRC recently adopted a new set of standing orders. When they were first put to the council, the vote on them was deferred until the next meeting. This was less due to specific issues with the standing orders, than a result of the manner in which they were presented to council. General Secretary Robert Fletcher had written them without informing the council that he was doing so. He followed the letter of the law in mailing them out five days prior to the meeting. Regardless, councillors were generally mistrustful of the manner in which they had been presented with standing orders, and demanded more time to consider them.

It might seem easiest to just buckle down and figure things out among yourselves, in the comfort and security of in-camera. However, doing this for constitutional reform is wrong. Many of you are aware of this, and justify your actions on pragmatic grounds. But this is flawed also. By discussing the issues of the constitution only in-camera, you make it more difficult for the student body to embrace it in October, making it more difficult for it to pass. If the constitution is not passed by the student body, all your input and hard work into it will have gone to waste. Students will be alienated from their union, something which happens enough already, and your ability to offer a long-lasting and tangible contribution to the next few years of the AUU will be compromised.

Do not speak of democratic mandate. Firstly, as I assume most of you know better than to claim that the annual AUU elections are a good way to gauge student support for particular candiates. But this is not necessary to my argument. Even if elections did show that the student body has made the educated decision to place you in power, unless you propose going in-camera to discuss all business of the AUU, to claim it for some things and while acknowledging the importance of accountability in others is an inconsistent argument. The benifits of going in-camera to discuss constitution are few, and easily achieved through more transparent means. If you are worried about disruption of meetings, this may be dealt with in the usual, open way (by removing the offenders through specific motions). If you are worried about the negative publicity backlash which may occur if unfavourable motions are discussed or adopted in relation to the constitution, let me assure you this backlash will be less than that likely to occur if students become aware that the entire negotiations for this constitution have occurred behind closed doors, and are instead presented with the controversial changes only after they have been drafted. You can trust students to have an over-developed sense of mistrust towards the AUU over an active concern in the issues.

Some of you (off the top of my head, Ash Brook, Mark Joyce, and Jake Wishart) have often voted against procedurals to move in-camera to discuss constitution. For this I applaud you. To the others, I hope I have convinced you: you have so little to gain from going in-camera, and so much to lose. I hope you keep this in mind next time you vote on a procedural to lock students out of discussions involving the constitution of their student union.

Yours,
Myriam Robin

Lavinia's presidential blog has been set to private. Oh well. Perhaps it'll be released when she retires, and she's just holding out for that book deal.

"The real issue is not that corruption was brought up in the media, it's that there was corruption." -Jake Wishart, AUU Board Director, Meeting 22nd Jan, 2009.

In the last Board meeting, a motion was put forward to censure Mark Joyce. His indiscretion was commenting for a press release that was intended to publicise the corrupt way in which this year's NUS delegates were appointed. According to Lavinia Emmett-Grey, this was against the AUU's media policy, and ought to be dealt with severely. As a result, the act of outing the corruption took on almost as much significance as the original dodgy dealings, which was never even admitted as dishonest. The argument was that Mark had taken on a responsibility to work in the best interests of the Board when he became a director, and that he had gone against that by commenting for the press release.

This raised a very interesting question about the AUU Board. Namely, do its best interests lay in clinging to the last shreds of reputation; or in exposing previous bad practice, airing the problems and then rebuilding?

Let's start with a painful fact: the students at Adelaide University don't trust the Union. This is for one of two reasons.

1. The AUU is irrelevant. The majority of students probably know it exists, but don't see what it does for them or why they should get involved. I can see where they're coming from when all they see of it is the occasional event, which they may or may not realise the AUU organised. While ignorance isn't the same as distrust, these students have to know the AUU before they can trust it.
2. The AUU is run by politically-minded factional hacks. While this is not exclusively true - I know some people who are involved in Board purely because they care - that's where the majority and the leadership base come from. While this might not be a problem in itself, it's not a secret that many board members aren't averse to following their interests at the Union's expense. Those students who know what's going on with the Board also know that corruption on Board can - and does - happen. So they don't trust it either.
   

This type of dirty dealing is also well known to the other body with a major interest in the Union's business: the University. If nothing else, the University has a non-voting representative present at every Board meeting, which is where most of the shonkiness is first aired. While this representative rarely says much, it is foolish to think that those University staff who care about the Union are ignorant about how it actually operates.

In the furor about the AUU's media policy at the last meeting, the requirement that Board directors operate in the AUU's best interest was repeatedly raised. Mark commented at one point that he believed his actions to have followed this rule. Despite the President's immediate response ("HOW IS THIS POSSIBLY IN OUR BEST INTERESTS?! To go to the Advertiser? That's absurd!"), this view has a lot of merit. It may be that an attempt to face up to the corruption of the past, deal with it and maintain an honest Board is the only way to regain the trust of those students who have been driven away from the AUU.

The first - but not the hardest - task for the AUU if they are to clean up their act on this front is to face up to the dishonesty and self-interest of the past. Taking responsibility for previous actions would create a much better atmosphere and allow the Board to move on to more important issues. It would also make it harder for directors to get away with such dishonest behaviour in the future. This would require Board directors to re-think some of their behaviour. Some of them don't seem to see how their behaviour could be seen as corrupt, or claim that it was justified by a lack of time. This is ridiculous when it also happens to deliver an advantage to their faction at the national conference, and absurd when it happens as frequently as it does now.

The potential drawback of this tack is that it would make the student community aware that there has been corruption within the Board. However, as we observed before, everyone who cares knows this already, so it wouldn't be the problem that it seems.

The other, harder task for the Board would be to maintain honest operations, free of factional priorities and with nothing other than the best interests of the AUU at heart. This would take a lot of effort - and self-restraint in some cases - and would not deliver immediate results. It would also require some of the quieter voices on board to think about what they're involved with, and to have the courage to say something when they believed that everything was not in order. If combined with other good practices, this has the potential to recreate the rapport between students and the student body and make the Union fill its place on campus, which has been sadly empty for years now.

While an effort to face and deal with corruption could lead to some bad press for the Board in the short term, it would be a worthwhile endeavour for the Board of 2009. It would go some way to clearing the slate, building an improved relationship between the Union and the students and make it a whole lot harder for anyone to mess around in the same way in the future. In the long term, it has great potential to enrich the quality of education and campus life at Adelaide and pave the way for a return to the 'golden days' of the Adelaide University Union.

My ultimate round-up of what's been happening as a result of this year's NUS appointments, so that we don't have to refer back quite so far when discussing the latest happenings:

• Mid August: Nominations for NUS were lodged. Here's the full list of nominees.
• Late August: Elections for NUS (as well as others) were cancelled.
• Late November: The NUS delegates were appointed by Board. Two of the delegates never nominated for the position, and many of those who did nominate weren't aware that the choice was being made.
• Very End of November (juuust before NUS): The exec authorised the payment of the NUS affiliation fee of $3,300, despite the fact that the exec is only constitutionally permitted to authorise payments of up to $2,000. In addition, the Board had been assured in the previous meeting that the vote on NUS delegates did not pertain to whether they would affiliate, only to who they would send as delegates if they did. 3 of the 4 exec members who voted were also NUS delegates.
• Mid December: The exec's decision to affiliate was voided on the basis that it was against policy, then passed by Board, because affiliation was still wanted. Jake Wishart and Aaron Fromm also put forward a motion that exec minutes have to be passed by board. It turned out that this was already a policy, but was generally supported anyway (the exec meeting was only a day or two before the board pack was due in, so minutes weren't submitted for want of time). Someone (Sorry, I don't have a name for who proposed this motion. Feel free to leave it in the comments) motioned for Board directors to be able to spectate at Exec meetings, and Jake put forward a motion for a conflict of interest register to be circulated at the start of every meeting and for those with a conflict not to be able to speak or vote on the issue. Both of these motions are passed too.
• Later Mid December: Ex-Board director and 2008 NUS nominee Sandy Biar released a press release to the Advertiser containing quotes from directors Mark Joyce. Aaron Fromm also gave quotes, but revoked them before the release date.
• January: Lavinia Emmett-Grey put forward a motion to condemn Mark Joyce for his comments as they were not 'in the best interests of the Board'. This lead to a wide-ranging and convoluted discussion of what counted as the 'best interests', and whether it actually broke the AUU media policy as was claimed. In the end, the media policy was redefined, though not in any way that was actually relevant to the question, and Mark was not condemned, as he appeared to have believed at the time that it was in the Board's best interests.

I've taken a bit more liberty than usual, so again, consider this an editorial. It's about me, indirectly, so off course I'm finding restraint particularly difficult. Not that I usually have, or even try to have, much luck with it.

As outlined in a previous post, several Board members have aired their discontent about some aspects of Adelaide University’s NUS involvement to outside media sources.

Board members were told at a recent training day, as well as in an email sent out by AUU General Manager David Coluccio after the Sandy Biar's Media Release came to light, that they are not allowed to make comments to or conduct interviews with the media, as stated in the media policy (avaliable here).

As a part of the media, naturally I am not happy about this. Thankfully, I know better than to take directives like that at face value. And indeed, a perusal of the media policy sheds light on two interesting facets of this problem.

Firstly, ‘media’ is very broadly defined.

2.2 ‘Media’ includes but is not limited to press, radio and television.

Off course, with such a broad definition, I effectively can’t approach anyone for information but AUU President Lavinia Emmett-Grey, or David Coluccio. This has not been the way that political commentary about the AUU has been written in the past. On Dit has for years sought out quotes and interviews with those involved in student politics, and needless to say Board directors did not always seek permission from higher-ups in order to do so.

So far, the policy as interpreted by Lavinia and David Coluccio has been constantly flouted. But not to fear. The policy is really much more reasonable than they have suggested, this being the second interesting thing I discovered. The ‘gag’ clause in question is 4.1, which states that:

4.1 AUU staff and elected representatives may not grant interviews to the media unless the AUU President, the relevant affiliate president, or if appropriate the AUU General Manager has given authorization outlining what they may say on behalf of the AUU or affiliate…

The clause then goes on to outline how specific the authorization has to be.

It’s not the most legible clause I've had the pleasure of reading over the past few weeks. It says, in plain English, ‘AUU staff and elected representatives may not grant interviews…without authorization’. But it continues: ‘without authorization outlining what they may say on behalf of the AUU or affiliate…’ As long as they make clear that they are only speaking their individual views, there is no reason why this should prevent Board directors from speaking to the media.

Clauses 4.2 to 4.4 then outline who may speak out on behalf of the AUU. For example, one can only speak on behalf of arms of the AUU of which one is a part. These clauses are sensible ways to ensure the chain of command with official information, but not gag orders.

One could make an argument that, by definition, everything a Board director says is on behalf of the AUU. But the AUU is by definition a political organization as well as a corporate one. Political entities do not function by giving only the ruling parties the ability to speak to the media. Such a policy would mean that all checks and balances on power, resultant from the democratic backlash against bad policy, would be circumvented. Off course those in the minority are going to seek to undermine those in the majority by publicizing everything they feel is wrong. That’s a way a democracy works. Attempts which prevent them doing so treat the AUU solely as a business. The fact that Board directors are elected makes this approach, well, at best ludicrous, and at worst, an intentional attempt to prevent democratic scrutiny.

Nonetheless, my personal opinions on democracy and the free press ultimately don't matter. The Media Policy does not state that everything Board directors say should be treated as if it's on behalf of the AUU. Until it does, that critique of those who spoke out isn't valid.

Speaking to the Advertiser may not have been the smartest or most responsible thing to do. But it certainly wasn't against the rules.

Also, I am very puzzled. Did the leadership of the AUU really think no-one would bother to read the Media Policy? Lift your game guys, please, this is too easy…

*Update: Some have claimed that the Corporations Act in fact defines everything said to the media in which one is introduced as a Board Director is definitionally on behalf of the organization. I have not been able to confirm this is the case, having not had time to consult the Corporations Act*

Forgive this mammoth of a post. I figured the issue deserved as little paraphrasing as possible. Or maybe I'm just a horrible reporter.

The much-anticipated December Union Board meeting was one of the most attended since the election of office bearers. Yasmin Freschi (Independent/Clubbers)was absent (overseas), as were Rhiannon Newman (Activate, at a family function) and Daniel Bills (Pulse) (interstate). Fei Tang (Passion) did not make an appearance (reason unknown). Apart from that, though, everyone was there for most of the meeting, including (surprise surprise) Sonja Jankovic (Liberals), Jianbin ‘Strong’ Jiang (Passion), and Ye Yang (Passion). The reason for the spike in attendance was clear: those concerned at the manner at which both the NUS delegates had been appointed, and at the actions taken at the subsequent Executive meeting, were mounting a challenge, which the (overwhelmingly) Labor delegates were preparing to fight.

Some questions were asked at the beginning of the meeting. Ash Brook (Independent/IndyGo) asked if Board members can attend Executive meetings. AUU Board President Lavinia Emmett-Grey (Independent/IndyGo) said that to the best of her understanding it is a close committee of Board, and thus no (There is nothing stating as such in the Rule on Committees, but it could be stated somewhere else). Soon after, by mutual agreement (helped along by procedural insistence by the Chair. i.e. Lavinia), all the interesting stuff was left to ‘Any Other Business’ at the end of the meeting, and thus Board breezed it’s way through its written concerns. Lavinia’s report was in the Board pack. She spoke briefly about it. Vice President John Bowers (Liberals) then presented a verbal report. It was extremely polite, and said absolutely nothing. From my recollection, he apologized that he had been extremely busy with his army commitments, meaning he did not have time to prepare a written report, before wishing everyone a Merry Christmas. How sweet of him.

The Board then moved onto the issue of the Oversea’s Student Association (OSA), which has been acting up again (not submitting reports, President Dilan Moragolle “not doing anything” etc). Several board members raised the question of whether it was effective to take any stronger action against the OSA, especially given that it had already been put on notice. Lavinia responded by pointing out that they had been put on notice for failing to submit two of their monthly reports, and, after being put on notice, had submitted them, and thus they had been taken off notice. Therefore, it was fine to put them on notice again, before considering stronger action (such as dis-affiliation). Strong (Passion) asked a question, and then made a comment. I didn’t quite catch it, but the mere fact that he spoke deserves a blog post all on its own. Board eventually decided to ‘express its displeasure’ in the minutes, as well as putting the OSA on notice. Again. That’ll teach them.

Board then decided to take steps to increase its involvement in the Waite and Roseworthy campuses. Andrew Anson (Pulse) somewhat pointedly remarks that ‘this is a good chance for Board directors to realize that this university doesn’t stop at North Terrace’. I have no idea what the attitude was about. Paris Dean (Activate) asks what benefits those at the other campuses have to gain from AUU Membership. Lavinia and Andrew respond by pointing to the Ambassadors card. A motion is passed for Lavinia and Andrew to address students at these campuses (the Roseworthy Proposal). The colonization begins.

AUU General Manager David Coluccio then asked that he be given permission to take up to $100,000 out of this years budget in order to fund various renovation and maintenance issues. He thinks this should be done now, while there is a surplus. Paris asked why there is a the problem with doing it out of next years reserves, as opposed to this year’s surplus. It’s a moot point, and Board approved the motion. There was some discussion on the air-conditioning, which Board has to fund. Apparently, one of the reasons Board sold commercial operations was that it would make the university responsible for structural maintenance. Given that the air-conditioners were installed by the Union, and not part of the original structure, they do not fall under the university's jurisdiction. Aaron Fromm (Independent/Clubbers) wanted the air-conditioners to be at least a 4-star energy rating in terms of energy efficiency. Those who considered him a Liberal were momentarily shocked, but recovered their composure as they realized he just wanted to save a buck.

Board was informed that the price of lockers is to double next year, to $20 for AUU members, $30 for non-members. The number of lockers is also set to increase, with repairs taking place on those which need it. Lavinia cut off various Board members who spoke out of turn on the speaking list. The look on the face of one of them in particular was priceless.

Andres Osvaldo Munoz-Lamilla (Sports Association President) turned up at 6:15 pm. That brought up to three the number of affiliate heads who attended the Board meeting (the other two being the Clubs Association VP Justin Kentish, and SRC President Paris Dean). Andres started gossiping and making faces at the back of the room. Lavinia threatened to kick him out. I think he left at this point.

Any Other Business. This was fun.

For those who haven’t read the last few entries (which I encourage you to do, trust me, they’re juicy), this is what happened so far:
Adelaide University each year sends six delegates to the National Union of Students (NUS, they'll be here when they decide getting their website up is a good idea). Elections for the NUS delegates were cancelled in August, due to procedural irregularities. By all appearances, this was the result of incompetence and dodgy legal advice rather than an intended outcome on the part of Lavinia and her Activate allies. So far, bad, but understandable. Next, at the last Board meeting, Lavinia claimed that NUS wanted a list of the delegates being sent. This was before NUS even informed the AUU of what the affiliation fee was. Lavinia then presented a list of six delegates, two of which had not even been NUS nominees when the elections were expected to go forward. Four of the people who voted in favour of this list were on it. This vote was sprung on many of those not in Pulse and Activate (the two factions whose candidates made up five out of six of the NUS positions), who were not aware it was to take place in the closing minutes of the Board meeting. This was especially brutal given that Lavinia had assured Board she would keep them informed of what was going in with NUS delegates at October meeting. Board had been assured during the November meeting by Paris that a vote on the delegates was not a vote on affiliation, giving the impression to some that there would be a vote on affiliation at some future date. And so there was, but not at Board. At the last Executive meeting, on the 28th of November, Executive approved the NUS affiliation fee, of $3300. This was in breach of the rule on Executive spending, which places a $2000 cap. As such, opposition to the way affairs have been conducted thus far was multi-faceted, and involved several issues, a fact which greatly complicated what is to follow.

Jake Wishart (Independent/IndyGo, member of the Greens), along with Aaron, put forward a motion that Executive minutes must be approved at the next meeting of Board. Lavinia suggested an amendment that In-Camera minutes be provided only by request. Apart from that, Lavinia also argued that this was already policy. Jake asked why it hadn’t happened then. Lavinia responded by saying there wasn’t enough time (note: The Board packs were sent out six days after the meeting, and I am told the deadline was only one or two days after the Exec meeting). Eventually the proposal is passed, with a slight amendment to the wording: Executive minutes shall be approved at or before the next Board meeting.

Next, there was a motion to allow Board members to be non-participatory observers at future Executive meetings. This proposal was extended to the next board meeting pending constitutionality. Lavinia expressed her displeasure at the fact that these motions had not been placed within existing policy, and had been so amateurishly formed.

Next, Jake puts forward a motion relating to conflicts of interest. The motion states that Board members must declare conflicts of interest, and not speak or vote on the issue, as is ‘industry best practice’. Lavinia again encourages Jake to place the motion within existing policy. Jake apologizes, but decides to press on with the motion anyway. It is carried.

While the first three motions were aimed at ensuring that such a debacle never occurs again, the next few deal more explicitly with the past.

The Executives approval of NUS funding then came up. There are questions, raised by Ash, as to whether Executives decision is not already void, given that they overstepped their bounds. This isn’t really answered. Lavinia says she was not aware of the cap being at $2000, having believed it to be a $5000 dollar cap. Both she, and AUU General Manager David Coluccio, apologized for their mistake (Note: Coluccio, according to a strict reading of the rule, has to approve all Executive spending, deeming it ‘necessary to the normal operation of the AUU’. He was absent from said Executive meeting).

Paris then claims that the issues are being bundled. He argues that Board is not in a position where it can refuse to fund NUS affiliation, as some of the delegates are already there, and have already paid out of their own pocket expecting to be reimbursed. As such, he claims they may sue for being misled by Board. Furthermore, he says that this would lead to a situation in which students cannot trust their own union to follow through with what it says it will.

Later, when Paris is out of the room, Mark Joyce (Independent/Clubbers/Liberal) answers his concerns by saying that he had warned the delegates that their funding to NUS was not a sure thing, and that they should be aware of the risk they are taking. Essentially, he said that a mistake by Executive does not justify a miscarriage of justice borne by students who do not have democratic representation (in a lot more words, and nowhere near as clearly). Lavinia questions his assertion to having ‘warned’ the delegates, saying he had never approached her. To be honest, I can’t see how any delegate would have taken Mark’s warning seriously, given that the President of the Board had assured them that their expenses would be paid. He maybe had more ground to stand on with the second point, but he didn’t elaborate on it. This is by far the most aggressive Mark has yet been at any meeting. He claimed Lavinia’s ‘time factor’ excuse is ridiculous, as she had time to ‘stitch up a deal’. Lavinia says there was no ‘deal’. Yea …
I’ll let you be the judge of that.

As the first point, as to whether Executives decision was void, was not followed up upon, Board then passed a motion to void the decision of the Executive. It is passed, with Lavinia, Andrew and Fletcher O’Leary (Activate, NUS Delegate) having their abstentions noted (in accordance with the Conflict of Interest motion passed earlier in the meeting).

After much discussion, the majority consensus seems to be that Board must affiliate to NUS, there being no other ethical option open to it. The challenge mounted by Jake Wishart, Aaron Fromm and the Liberals (Mark Joyce, VP John Bowers) dissolved when Jake said he believed the union should affiliate. The motion to affiliate was passed. Mark and John had their dissent noted.

You’d think that once the motion was passed, the meeting would be over. But not quite. Jake took one parting shot at Lavinia. He said (and I am paraphrasing from my notes here: ‘You had ample time to inform the Board [of the delegate vote]…You have treated this Board with contempt…and the delegates represent no students other than themselves…It is the sole fault of the Executive that we are in this position’. For a guy who ran on Lavinia’s ticket three months ago (although has admittedly been out in the cold for a while now)…wow.

Lavinia responded by describing how vague the talks she had had with NUS were. How nothing was decided upon until the last minute, and that she could not possibly be expected to inform Board of the developments of every ongoing negotiation she is involved with.

Jason Virgo then speaks. Another event worthy of its own headline. He speaks well too. He’s angry: ‘We elected an Executive; it is ridiculous to them overturn their motions just because we don’t like them’. He believed what he said, but I can’t help but think he missed the point. Executive was elected to follow the rule, which they did not do. They were not elected to do whatever they liked outside of the Constitution. I figure that if Executives decision was made automatically void, as it did not follow the rule, Jason would not have made the mistake of seeing this as a rejection of Executive's authority.

After this, Strong speaks up once more. He wants Board to put aside their political differences. How quaint. Board is generally appreciative of the fact that he has spoken, and for the most part seem glad that the meeting is nearly over.

Mark then brings up the numbers issue on Board. Basically, there are six factions on Board, each with more or less three members. Six NUS positions could thus be nicely divided up according to the wishes of the voters, as expressed via the only vote they had left open to them. It’s a good point, but one that should have been bought up at the last Board meeting when delegates were decided upon. It sure helps to spring things on Board when you want to get a dubious motion passed.

The next motion is to approve the funding for the delegates, as opposed to the costs of affiliation. It is put forward by Ash and Strong. Mark and John are against. There are six abstentions, being Fletcher, Andrew, Aaron, Jake, Lavinia, and one more person who’s name I didn’t manage to get down (let me know if you know who I’ve missed).

The meeting took nearly three hours, closing at seven forty-five pm.

Truth be told, at the end of it all, it was all somewhat anti-climactic. The crusading knights out to right the wrongs of the executive ended up being on less solid grounds than they thought. It didn’t help that when faced with the counter-arguments presented by Labor, they split into two camps. Not that that should be a surprise to anyone: how easily can a Green and the Liberals stay united? Jake’s contempt for Lavinia’s style of rule was however made vividly clear at this meeting, and is likely to have future repercussions. Furthermore, at the time of writing, it appears that The Advertiser is preparing to run a story on the alleged corruption involving NUS at Adelaide Uni. This, needless to say, is a huge embarrassment for both Lavinia and David Coluccio, even if the story portrays them in a good light.

What follows is an extremely critical account of the AUU Board. Given that fact, consider it an editorial, and treat it with a grain of salt.

The Board Committee Meeting of the 13th of November took place right in the middle of the exam period. Nonetheless, thirteen of the eighteen elected board members were present. Missing were all of Passion (international students faction), and the Liberals, being Sonja Jankovic and recently-elected Board VP John Bowers (studying? An apology would have been nice).

Opening business concerned the financial member numbers. Membership is to stay at $20 next year, with a target of 3000 members. Mark Joyce raised his concerns as to whether students would join in Semester 1, knowing that by Semester 2 they would be forced to pay for student services anyway (See Money Money Money). Not a bad question, but naturally, one scoffed at by Board President Lavinia Emmett-Grey and AUU General Manager David Coluccio. Truly, when will Mark learn that he’s not welcome on Board? He should just stop coming, after all, the Internationals and Liberals certainly got the message. Democratically elected, like that matters for anything.

But enough fooling around. The purpose of the meeting was to approve the new SRC constitution. Complaints about the language and content had been forwarded to Paris Dean (current SRC President, Activate), who worked systematically through the objections. Most of them were thoroughly boring, and I won’t abuse your patience by going into detail here, see the Board minutes if you care (when they’re eventually released, they’ll be here)

There were only three objections I can struggle to make of interest for the general reader. One concerned the rural officer. Many of the officer positions on SRC (Queer officer, Women’s Officer etc) are filled by one who ‘identifies’ as a member of that minority, as evidenced by a statutory declaration. A guy running for women’s officer would have to sign a piece of paper saying he identifies as a women. This tends to discourage those who would run for shits and giggles. However, a spirited discussion arose when discussing how to limit who can run for ‘rural’ officer. Oh yes, Board can’t decide on who is a women, or who is disabled, that would be discriminatory. But arbitrarily limit the rural position to those who have lived in the country for however months in the past three years, that Board can certainly do. I don’t care about the rural officer position, and I doubt you do either. However, the hypocrisy of Board amused me.

The next issue of contention was that of whether the SRC should be able to pay honoraria. All agreed that the financial situation of the SRC right now ruled this out, but many of those in the factions wanted to leave the option open for future years. Yasmin Freschi (Independent) was strongly opposed to this, feeling that the SRC should be run on a strictly volunteer basis. I haven’t spoken to her about this, but no doubt she feared a return to the days when people ran for the SAUA merely because it was a cushy job.

The final, and biggest, disagreement in Board concerned whether the SRC Constitution should explicitly recognize the native Aboriginal tribe who existed on the land before the University. Aaron Fromm (Independent) led the charge on this, arguing that this was a polarizing issue, and as such, native title should be recognized as a policy of the SRC, as opposed to being prominently displayed in the Constitution. He claimed that the SRC should be representative of student views, and not the political leanings of those who held the majority on Board. Lavinia responded by saying that recognizing the Aboriginal ‘owners’ was standard procedure, and would single the AUU out if it failed to include it in its constitutions. Furthermore, she said this was an issue that the Vice Chancellor was very passionate about, and that this was further reason why it must be included. She disputed Aaron's statement that it was a polarizing issue, saying that most Australians had no problem with it. Also, she said it would be ‘racist’ not to include it. Not that she was calling Aaron a racist, but, well, moving on. A caricatured discussion on the issue followed. Mark Joyce asked how singling out one group was an advancement of ‘equality’. Rhiannon Newman (Activate/Labor Left) responded to this by explaining positive discrimination. It’s becoming increasingly clear that the Left consider Mark stupid. He hasn’t shown signs of it getting to him, yet. But back to the Aboriginals. This issue was so poker hot that they left it to the end. When they got back to it, Paris Dean (Activate) suggested that agreement would not be forthcoming, so they went straight to a vote. The motion to give Aboriginal recognition was passed, with Yasmin, Mark and and Aaron asking to have their dissent noted.

In the closing issues, Lavinia dropped a bomb on the Board. She claimed that NUS wanted a list of the chosen delegates to represent Adelaide Uni by tomorrow, and that as such, it had to be decided now. This was the responsibility of Board, as elections had been cancelled due to legal irregularities earlier in the year (see No Elections?!). Lavinia produced a list of six names (Robert Fletcher, Fletcher O’Leary, Lavinia Emmett-Grey, Simone McDonnell, Andrew Anson and Daniel Bills). Paris at this point reminded those gathered that this was not a vote on whether or not the Union would seek NUS affiliation, that being dependent on costs which NUS had yet to release. Gobsmacked, the independents on Board watched as Pulse and Activate voted for the list. And is it any surprise that the two ‘rival’ factions were in perfect agreement, having received three delegates apiece? Of those ‘voted’ (I’ll call it democratic when those who had a personal interest abstain from the vote) on a free holiday, Fletcher O’Leary and Daniel Bills had not even expressed an interest in being NUS delegates prior to the election being cancelled. Calling the whole thing dodgy is an understatement. In a stroke, Lavinia and her Activate friends, as well as the Pulse faction, have shown that despite being largely fresh-faced, they are still capable of following in their factional-hack predecessors footsteps. Ironic, this time last year David Wilkins was in a lot of trouble for such behavior. Not being accountable with Board was what got him sacked. If a just standard were applied, Lavinia would be in hot water now. No doubt she let those in her faction know what had happened, and it is highly possible that the NUS deadline sprung on her just like she said it did. The fault lies in the list presented. It represented those who, by banding together, held the balance of power, not those who were elected. But as long as noone's watching, why not?

Oh, and this is as much the absentee's fault as it is the factionalists by the way. If everyone elected even bothered just to show up, such stunts would never suceed.

The Board meeting on August 7th saw yet another election take place (could this be a record for a single year of Board?). After Ellen Ketteridge’s resignation, the position of Student Representation Council President was wide open and letting in the breeze. David Wilkins and Paris Dean were both nominated for the position. Unsurprisingly, Paris – who has done substantial work with the SRC this year and made his intentions to run for their President next year very clear – is now SRC President.

The general SRC elections were also very topical during that meeting. As a result of the current election rules, the elections for everything but the AUU Board (that is, SRC reps, National Union of Students reps, Student Radio Directors and the On Dit editors) will be held separately from the Board elections. While this won’t affect the election process much for most students (there will be two boxes for the ballot papers and the like, but nothing major), it means that there will need to be two returning officers to oversee the election. The AUU has been (amazingly, unexpectedly and belatedly) fortunate in securing the services of a former AEC employee to oversee the Board election, but this left the SRC and other elections bereft of an R.O. Lavinia proposed to the Board that they pass a motion to instate James Moffatt, a Music student at Adelaide Uni (and a friend of mine), as the R.O. A couple of Board directors protested on the basis that it was unlikely that James would have the time, the understanding or the confidence to execute the role properly. Despite this, the desperate need for a returning officer to ensure an operating SRC and membership for the NUS led to James being appointed to the position with a small majority of votes.

A more ongoing issue that was raised is the level of transparency within the AUU. Directors are meant to keep quiet on all the important upcoming issues. This is to keep them free of outside influence and capable of making decisions in the Board’s best interests. For a start, in the context of the AUU Board this seems a little naïve – most of the people seeking to affect Directors’ votes to suit another (factional) agenda are already on the Board and have full access to all that information. Members of the Board from all the factions made their issues with this idea quite clear, pointing out that students can only get information about what’s happening in the AUU through a 2-4 week out of date column that only covers issues that have already been discussed at Board. It was suggested that if students actually care, they would come to the Board meetings and get involved, but this was argued down on the basis that most students would have to put ridiculous amounts of time just finding out when and where the meetings would be. Even then, only Board members know what’s on the agenda before the meeting starts. In essence, this leads to a system where plenty of people know what’s going on – all the people who are already cosy with our student politicians. It’s still difficult for anyone who’s not already involved with student politics to find out anything about what’s really going on.