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The meeting began with a round-up of everyone’s efforts this week. I’ll cover this quickly, because the rest of the meeting was a lot more interesting. OUSA President Ruby Sycamore-Smith continues work on the General Manager’s review. Education Officer Laura Harris has been attending the forums and is trying to push for the Summer School season to have a lot more student engagement. The Colleges Officer has finalised the sexual assault policy. Campaigns Officer Hamish Barker continues his work on Mental Health Week. He says, “she’s not looking too bad. Get Ready.” We have been for about eight months, Hamish. The Welfare Officer has organised a lot of events and is trying to establish a list of accessible flats for disabled students.

Admin VP Ryan Edgar has been working on the candidates’ forums, held the budget forum and “VSA stuff, VSA stuff, more VSA stuff.”

The Finance Officer has attended Dunedin City Council meetings. He said the proposed alcohol policy changes mean “Capone, Urban Factory and Boogie Nites will shut if the proposed changes happen. This isn’t scaremongering. The majority of their revenue comes between 1am and 3am, so if the one-way door policy comes in, they will not be able to function.” He is also organising reforms to the budgeting processes, to make the budget “more accessible to Executive members and to students.” He suggested OUSA approach the University to ask them to oppose the proposed changes and that they organise “a march or something.”

Ryan presented the University Committees appointment list. “I was under the impression everyone’s name was going to be on this document,” said Ruby. The Postgraduate Officer responded, “The point of bringing it, I think, was to show who wasn’t on it.” Ruby said she wants to see it complete and wanted Ryan to find all the representatives on the committees as soon as possible, as this was expected “months ago.” Ryan explained, “This reflects the minutes of all previous meetings. I’m not God.”

Laura also defended Ryan saying, “I was with him. There was a decent effort to try and find what committees people were appointed to. I was with him when he was ctrl-F-ing the OUSA site for a long time.” Critic believes this to mean he was pressing the “Control” and “F” keys to find key words. Laura offered to help complete it. Ruby said, “Great, next time it’ll be presented and completed.” The tone kept people awake, at least.

Reaching the discussion of general business, it was straight to the Volunteer Services Abroad (VSA). Ruby asked that Executive members consider their involvement with Critic. “I am the spokesperson to Critic … make sure you alert me to these stories.”

“The Critic article gave the impression the whole Executive thought VSA was sending students on a holiday,” said Ruby. The Postgraduate Officer said he wanted to defend Ryan, as he was “just answering a couple of questions to Critic.”

The VSA issue refers to a recent decision of the Executive to withdraw their VSA membership, with the idea that they should only donate their time and resources to charities that do not directly help students. Since Critic printed an article on this two weeks ago, a petition to reverse the decision has received over 400 signatures. Various posts on Facebook have received a lot of attention and the Recreation Officer recently publicly posted that he disagreed with the Executive’s decision despite having not opposing it during the meeting. Ruby sternly told the Recreation Officer off for “publicly stating that you were going against what the Executive had agreed upon.” She added, “And you apologised to the student body regarding an Executive decision without approaching the Executive.”

Ryan wanted to discuss the issue in committee of the whole, “it’s a sensitive issue.” Ruby said no because “it’s not commercially sensitive.” Thanks Ruby. For a second there, Critic felt the support. That didn’t last long.

Ryan blamed the flare-up of the issue on “incorrect perceptions amongst the student body. It’s not OUSA’s place to fund VSA.”

He explained that “there are many causes we would like to support, but students pay us for the services we provide, not to divert spending to other causes.” He added, “it’s the precedent we are setting.”

Ryan suggested OUSA look into supporting the UniVol programme, which is run through VSA.

The Welfare Officer also believed the Executive should be setting a precedent, “It’s 90 per cent government funded. Why don’t we fund Rape Crisis, or any other association that asks for money?”

The Postgraduate Officer pointed out that “we can’t become a member of those. We were a member of VSA. I think there’s a benefit to showing we’re listening to students. Are you happy spending all that time on $100?”

Ruby was concerned that OUSA had received a letter from an OUSA life member and the petition was continuing to increase. “We need to advocate for them and support them.”

Ryan concluded, “It’s not about the money. It’s about the precedent we’re setting. Fuck it, I have even thought of paying the $100 myself so as not to have OUSA paying it and setting a wrong precedent.” He formally apologised for his comment about VSA being about sending students on “a holiday” but he maintained, “it’s not our place to fund them.”

Laura believes OUSA should “take our time with this. They don’t need the $100 right now.”

Ruby reasoned that “we’re representing the students - let’s make sure we’re doing it thoroughly.”

After all this talk, three motions were moved - to receive and recognise the petition, to receive and recognise the letter, and to agree to find an agreement with VSA to form the best outcome.

Ryan suggested putting the decision to referendum as over 100 signatures had been received, but the Postgraduate Officer was against it. “For 100 bucks? Nah.” Ruby supported the idea, only if the referendum included other memberships considered.

Ruby concluded, “That Critic article has completely misled the students.” Critic believes it was balanced.

Ryan double-concluded, “I really appreciate VSA and what they do.” He said this about five times; just to make sure we quoted him.