Adelaide Student Politics

Posted: 30th of October 2009

The Hughes Plaza is being redeveloped into a student space, and we students get input on this one! I'm organising a chat with the developers so that I can write something up for you properly, but for now, come to the focus groups next week and have your say on how it ought to go.

There's two groups, 10am-11am and 3-4pm in the Ira Raymond Room. RSVPs are to michelle.chaplin@adelaide.edu.au.

If you want to know more about it, take a look at the FAQs on the site.

Posted: 30th of October 2009

In terms of power in the University of Adelaide pond, University Council is where the big fish lurk. The Council consists of most of the heads of departments and standing committees, as well as the big whigs we receive emails from every now and then. Council approves or makes the biggest decisions facing students at the University of Adelaide.

The Council allows three positions to students, which are decided by online election. Two for undergrads, one for a post-grad. These positions are fiercely contested, and no wonder, with many students figuring it better to be a weak voice on the Council with power than a strong one on less directly influential bodies like, say, the Adelaide University Union. Furthermore, Council elections are usually contested by groups who don’t often bother with the AUU, such as the Medical Students and the Liberals.

This year’s undergraduate election is a four-way contest.

The favourite is Chris Wong, a Med student who is widely expected to be assured an easy ride onto Council due to the significant block vote behind him. I know very little about him, other than that he has three times as many people on his facebook group than the next highest candidate.

Close second is Lavinia Emmett-Grey, the former AUU President no doubt familiar to readers of this blog. If there’s one thing I’ve been assured of in my time watching student politics, it’s the pull of name recognition. Lavinia has more than most, and a dedicated network of people she’s recruited into student politics behind her to boot. Due to both these reasons, I wouldn’t be surprised to see her polling very highly.

Another likely to achieve some level of name recognition is Paris Dean, the long-haired socialist who has in his time as AUU Board Director and SRC President developed quite a reputation. How much of this is due to his Samson-like qualities is uncertain. Paris unexpectedly bowed out of recontesting his position on Union Board earlier this year. Many, myself included, thought that it was his throwing in the towel, but through this nomination, it appears he has his sight set on bigger things.

The final, largely unknown, contestant is Law/International Studies student Tomas Macura. A newcomer to student politics, his left-wing credentials saw him secure a preference-deal with Paris. Both have preferenced each other second, and then Lavinia third. Lavinia has not formally preferenced anyone, apart from Xu Ting (more on him below).

As already stated, Chris’ position on University Council is almost certain. The fight will be for the second position, which will likely fall to either Paris or Lavinia. I expect Lavinia will secure more primary votes, but if (or when) Tomas is knocked out, at least some of his preferences will flow to Paris. It is uncertain whether this will be enough for Paris to overtake Lavinia on preferences. Both will be anxiously awaiting the result.

In the post-grad race, three are contesting.

The first is Xu Ting. Xu made it onto this year’s Union Board, and has the block international vote behind him. However, I question how many international students will vote in an online, as opposed to campus-based, election. Many do not hesitate to cross the line in AUU election week to vote for someone who speaks their language, but I am uncertain if they will turn out in similar numbers when voting is more difficult to direct, as it is in an online forum.

The second is David Coluccio. David is the General Manager of the Adelaide University Union. As such, some have protested the conflict of interest in his contesting the position. After all, he will no doubt have a pro-union bias in his role, should he get the Council position. Rodney Crewther is a Council Member (Staff Representative), and also heavily involved in the local NTEU Branch, and so it is worth noting that Cullucio’s decision to contest in no way breaks precedent. It could place David in an interesting position however when the Council discusses issues to do with the AUU, the relationship between those two being considerably different from that of the University and the NTEU. Despite the many arguments I have heard to the contrary, I’m inclined to think that should he get on, a seat on University Council would be a significant gain for the Union.

The last post-graduate candidate is Morteza Mohammadzaheri, about whom I know absolutely nothing. Update: Several readers have informed be that Morteza is involved with the Post-Grad Students Association, an (currently barely operating) affiliate of the AUU.

Voting closes 10am Friday the 30th. The results should be known by that afternoon. Update: My bad. It closes at that time on November the 6th. I.e. you still have 1 week to vote.

Posted: 21st October 2009

A relieved President returned. A VP upset. Speeches. Betrayal. Anger. The salvaging of alliances. I am speaking, ladies and gentlemen, of last year’s Office Bearer vote. This year? Absolutely nothing exciting to report. Not even one speech to summarize. When one (or, strictly speaking, two allied) factions win so completely, it makes everything...well, predictable. And much, much quicker. Below are the results of the 2009/2010 Board Office Bearer votes.

• President: Fletcher O’Leary (Activate). Unopposed.
• Vice President: Emmanuel Njuguna (Indy-Go). Unopposed.
• Executive: Raffaele Picollo (Activate), Kim Dowling (Indy-Go), Eric Fan Yang (Internationa), Xu Ting (Internationa). Shoaming Zhu (Liberal/International) also nominates, but misses out.
• Student Media Chair: Patrick McCabe (Indy-Go). Unopposed.
• Union Activities Chair: Claire Wong (Innovate). Unopposed.
• Finance: Satchi Riehl (Activate), Tim Picton (Innovate), and Eric Parsonage (Independent Technocrat). Shoaming Zhu again nominates, but is unsuccessful.

They take their places December 1st. Two meetings of the 2008/09 Board remain.

Posted: 26th of September

The first Clubs Association meeting of the new term was held on Tuesday the 15th of September.

Summary:

• AUU President Lavinia Emmett-Grey voiced concerns about the CA's new website.
• The AUES was taken off notice.
• After much brouhaha, the meeting decided that the Hawke Club Affiliation would be postponed to the next meeting.
• It was revealed that no progress had been made with the new CA constitution since the last meeting.

From the moment the meeting opened there were problems. All tabled documents for the meeting, including the agenda, minutes from the previous meeting and a draft CA constitution, had only been sent to clubs two days prior to the meeting*. As a result, few of the delegates present had read any of the material to be discussed at the meeting. CA President Matt Taylor and General Executive Member Ash Brook took responsibility for the documents not being sent out**, with Ash remarking: "The minutes [from the last meeting not being there] was us being slack."

The first point of contention in the meeting was the CA's new website. During his report, President Matt Taylor reported that the CA's new website, which had cost $2000 to set up, had been functional for one week before the servers went down and it was rendered nonoperational.

AUU President Lavinia Emmett-Grey voiced reservations about the CA's website, and the decision of the executive not to put in on the AUU's newly-upgraded one. Instead of spending $2000 on the current website (with further funds now required to fix it), Lavinia said that the CA could have a web presence on the AUU site, with the AUU footing the bill. Furthermore, Lavinia expressed concern at the way in which funding for the CA site was approved, describing as "dodgy" the fact that the $2000 dollars was spent by the executive without the approval of a CA meeting. While Matt Taylor claimed that the previous CA meeting (held on the 6th of May this year) had given the executive license to appropriate funds for the site, the minutes of that meeting contain nothing to suggest that was the case.

Next was the Vice President's Report. VP Peta Johannsen's report was concerned mainly with the ClubFest event that was held during the first week of semester. The meeting was provided with no written report, and nor was there any written summary of the financial details of the event. Peta, while claiming that on the whole ClubFest had been a success, conceded that there had been insufficient advertising for the event. "I think it only became clear on the day that it hadn't been advertised enough", she said.

The next item on the agenda was a motion to move the AUES (Engineering Society) off notice. They were originally put on notice following a series of incidents involving varying levels of harassment by some of their rank-and-file members. AUES Vice President Kevin Chan gave a rundown of the AUES's activities this year, as well as steps that have been taken to combat sexual harassment issues within the organization. The motion to take the AUES off notice was passed with no dissent.

The meeting now moved on to the headline issue of the evening. At the CA AGM of 30th of October 2008, the Bob Hawke Appreciation Society had its bid to be Provisionally Affiliated to the Clubs Association defeated in controversial circumstances, but was granted Provisional Associate Affiliation.

The next item written on the agenda was to grant the Hawke Club, previously the cause of much debate at the previous clubs AGM in 2008, Provisional Affiliation, but, after much confusion, Ash Brook corrected this, saying that the motion at was actually to make the Hawke Club Associate Affiliates.
With all these types of affiliates being described, Matt Taylor took a moment to explain:

• If a club wants to be affiliated to the CA, it must first apply for and receive Provisional Affiliation. This allows the club to receive grants, and get many of the other advantages of being an affiliated club.
• Once a club has been Provisionally Affiliated for 6 months, it can apply for Full Affiliation, which also comes with benefits from the CA.
• A club that is a Provisional Associate Affiliate or an Associate Affiliate is affiliated only in name, and receives no benefits from the CA.
Who knows which of the CAs many constitutions this is outlined in. More on that in a second.

Matt Taylor, noting the absence of anyone from the Hawke Club, specifically it's President Andrew Anson, proposed that the motion to make it an Associate Affiliate be postponed to the next CA meeting. This idea drew criticism from a number of delegates, especially Rhiannon Newman (Labor Club Delegate), Paris Dean (representing the Law Students Society) and Lavinia (AUU President), all of whom were instrumental in defeating the Provisional Affiliation of the Hawke Club last year (and are all part of the Labor Club executive). Paris put a motion stating that the Hawke Club may not apply for affiliation for six months, arguing in an impassioned speech that Anson (who was referred to as though he was synonymous with the Hawke Club) would simply not show up until the numbers would be more in his favour.

The debate primarily consisted of a back and forth between the Labor Club trio and the CA executive. Rhiannon pointed out that there was a precedent for discussing the affiliation of clubs without a representative present, citing the Provisional Affiliation of the Humanities Society at the last CA meeting. General Executive Member James Moffatt responded that, since this was not Provisional Affiliation, there was no precedent for this case. Furthermore, he pointed out, the Hawke club's affiliation was significantly more controversial than that of the Humanities Society, and as such it should be treated differently.

Lavinia then had some questions for Matt Taylor. As part of the conditions of the Hawke Club's Provisional Associate Affiliation, she pointed out, they were required to give reports on their activities and events every two months. Lavinia asked Matt why none of these reports had been made available. Matt, rather sheepishly, revealed that he had indeed received these reports, but they had been kept confidential at Andrew Anson's request.

The argument continued for about 15 minutes before Ash pointed out that, since the agenda had only been sent out two days before the meeting, it was possible that Anson (his name again used in lieu of the name of the club he heads) had not received official notification that the Affiliation would be considered at this meeting. While Lavinia, Paris and Rhiannon all declared that Andrew had known, and that his absence was a deliberate ploy, they conceded that the Hawke club had probably not received official notification, and, after a quarter of and hour of sound and fury, Paris' motion was withdrawn. Matt Taylor was asked by council to table all of the Hawke Club's bi-monthly reports at the next council meeting, and to ensure that they are officially notified that their affiliation will be on the agenda at that meeting.

Having spent a large amount of time dealing with the Hawke Club issue, the meeting demonstrated a surprising amount of efficiency and dealt with the next eight agenda items without any ado. The Spanish and Game Development clubs received provisional affiliation, and the Fringe, Role Playing and Games clubs were all made full affiliates. Three grants were quickly approved, including $494 for the EVAC (Video Games and Anime) Club to purchase a Playstation 3, which, according to the grant application, would be available for members to borrow.

Once all the grant applications had been dispensed with, AUES representatives inquired as to the progress of an application they had made earlier in the year for a $1000 grant to cover some of the cost of a lost cash box. The executive revealed that the application had been lost, and council gave them the authority to give the money in the break before the next meeting.

At this point, President Matt Taylor left the meeting, citing a need to study for an honours presentation. Soon after his exit, a number of delegates also left, meaning the meeting no longer had quorum.

The final issue of the evening came with the proposed new CA Constitution. Originally drafted by and presented to the previous Clubs Council two months ago by James Moffatt, it was presented almost unchanged to the Council a second time. James apologized, became the latest executive member to "take full responsibility" for not getting something done and outlined a plan to draft and pass a new constitution by mid October.

Without quorum and rapidly losing delegates, the meeting moved on to any other business. The final motion of the evening was to order pizza from a different place for the next meeting. With that pivotal issue dispensed with, the meeting was closed.

VIDEO: Adelaide joins national uni strikes.

See this for a national (and altogether less favourable) perspective. The NTEU also has been keeping up its own coverage.

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.

Posted: 9th of September

The Left on campus has been terrified of Andrew Anson for months. The relative new-comer to student politics took over the Labor Right faction when all its experienced members were eliminated at last year’s AUU elections, and has since quietly but purposefully gone about amassing support for a bid for the Presidency. His hopes were dashed at the most recent elections, to the suprise of many.

With a Board of 16 following the referendum passing, plus with current President Lavinia Emmett-Grey having a vote on all office bearers for 2010, Andrew needed to pull off 9 Board votes to succeed. With the Liberals vowing never to deal with him (though they didn’t seem to pleased with the prospect of a Left candidate either), this meant his faction, Innovate, along his international student allies, needed to together put up the necessarily number on Board.

Alas, the internationals did much worse than expected. The existence of a Chinese student on the Liberal ticket (Liberty) may have mitigated some of their block international vote, and their decision not to campaign heavily after the first two or three days meant that they only managed to get two Board directors elected (being faction head Eric Fan Yang and Xu Ting).

Things didn’t end up much better for the Labor Right. Innovate ran 10 people for Union Board, and only managed to get three of them on (the same number as this year). Juan Legaspi, Steph Ghellar and Daniel Bills were knocked out in the final minutes, making this the second year a host of Labor Right candidates just miss out. Andrew managed an impressive primary vote count (112) to retain his seat, and is joined by Claire Wong (who has made a comeback after losing her seat at last year’s election) and first-year Tim Picton.

That’s five. Out of the nine needed. Without the Liberals and one of the Independents, Andrew was screwed.

Mark Joyce (Liberty), at a stage of the night where he hadn't realized the extent of the Activate/Indy-Go alliance, said that his candidates would not support the Left or Right if they insisted on putting up what he considered inferior candidates like Andrew Anson or Fletcher O’Leary (the presumed Left candidate). In the end, the Liberals lost out too. The monstrous primary vote of both Penelope Nugent and Shaoming Zhu wasn’t enough to get their teammate Daniel Fawcett elected, meaning the Liberals control one less seat than they did this year on the AUU Board.

If everyone so far lost, who gained? Overwhelmingly and conclusively, the Left. Activate managed five (Ashleigh Lustica, Sarah Anderson, Satchi Riehl, Raffaele Picollo and Fletcher O’Leary). Their left Independent Allies, Indy-Go, got three (Emmanuel Njuguna, Patrick McCabe, and Kim Dowling). Given that the Board size has decreased, and the Left has one more person on than they did last year (Activate only had 4 in 2009), their power has increased significantly. Not forced to negotiate with either the Internationals or the divided Right (Labor Right and the Liberals), they’ll get their pick of every position, and, when united, every policy. The three Indy-Go Board directors are not bound by a caucus – and may thus act as the balance of power later on in the year – but in terms of office bearer positions are expected to side with Activate (although this didn’t happen last year due to Jake Wishart). Small 'i' independent Eric Parsonage is also expected to vote with the Left for the Officer Bearer votes, although due to Lavinia's vote they won't need him until later in the year.

This year sees the Left in its strongest position during my time at University. Despite losing Rhiannon Newman – the Activate leader – and Lavinia Emmett-Grey – the head of Indy-Go, who withdrew herself from the elections – they have managed to secure enough votes to make any policy they all agree on, provided it has Eric Parsonage's support, certain. Coupled with Indy-Go and Activate's success on the SRC, the Labor Right is due for another year in the wilderness.

Let’s see what the Left do with their newfound power.