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Last Tuesday OUSA held its first student forum of 2011. Eight motions were discussed, all of which are to be put to online referendum between May 23 and June 2.
Included in the referendum will be motions addressing amendments to the OUSA constitution, the Code of Student Conduct and interest free student loans.
 

Turnout to the forum was lacklustre, with the crowd comprising mostly of the Executive and OUSA staff members. At one point, a count showed that of the 50 people in the Main Common Room, only 16 were watching the forum. Of the 16 people that attended, only three were not associated with the Exec or OUSA in some way.

 
Online streaming of the meeting meant those who were unable to attend in person were still able to watch the debate live. Unfortunately, online viewers amounted to only eight in total, one of which was the Critic office.

 
Motions 1-4 concerned OUSA's financial reporting and were all discussed with no objections. Motion five proposed amendments to the OUSA constitution regarding the process of moving motions to referendum, of which two different options were put forward.
 

Recently resigned OUSA President Harriet Geoghegan spoke to Constitution option A, where motions are reviewed by the Executive when they are first proposed. The Executive would then have a choice to send the motion straight to referendum for voting, or alternatively to send the motion to an independent mediator, who would then decide whether the motion should be moved using a specific set of criteria. The criteria consist of; being frivolous, being unfair to an individual or individuals, being biased, or relating to finance or expenditure. 
 

Finance and Services Officer Dan Stride spoke to Option B, which would send all motions to an SGM to be debated upon. Stride argued that Option A would reduce the student body to "passive rubber stamps" and "computer clicks," and contended that the poor forum turnout was possibly due to OUSA's move to online referendums. Unfortunately for Stride the ensuing debate made it clear that most of the 16 crowd members were firmly in support of Option A.
 

The issue of the Code of Student Conduct, however, unified the crowd. University Council Student Representative Jonathan Rowe spoke in support of official recognition of the code by OUSA, saying it would enhance the chances of student representation at disciplinary cases. As it stands there is no student representation on the disciplinary board. This was backed up by speeches from both Geoghegan and Stride.
 

The final two motions discussed OUSA's policy towards interest-free student loans. Both Geoghegan and Stride spoke to opposing any 2011 government budget changes that
would reduce access to interest-free student loans.

 
The meeting was finally wrapped with a motion put forward to thank Geoghegan for her work with OUSA over the past two years. After a brief moment of awkwardness where it was put to the audience whether anyone opposed this, cheers and applause broke out.
 

When asked about the poor turnout and lack of promotion of the meeting, Geoghegan said that extra publicity given to last year's forum had been unsuccessful in increasing student attendance.
 

Nevertheless, some members of the Exec still felt more advertising should have been done. The lack of interest from students does not bode well for OUSA and student politics in general, especially with VSM looming. As Stride so ardently summarised it in one of his dialogues, "this meeting is a joke."
 

Student forums and online referenda were introduced last year to replace Student General Meetings (SGM). Students are able to vote on the referendum motions online from 23rd May to 2nd June off the OUSA website (ousa.org.nz)