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SU President raises concerns over Student Bar’s projected losses
Two new societies recognised despite moratorium by Katie Hughes · News Editor
by Katie Hughes · News Editor
Students’ Union President Pat de Brún has raised concerns over the long-term planning of the Student Bar following a Bar Committee meeting held on Monday February 20th at which an estimate of the Bar’s accounts from July to December were made available. He stated that “at the minute the figures aren’t finalised so I can’t say what they are yet but there is some cause for concern and I do have some concerns about the long-term planning for the bar. It just means that there’s going to be a lot of work there for all involved on the Management Committee and the management of the bar itself.” De Brún further stated that despite his faith in the figures presented to the Bar Committee, he was reluctant to give the figure at which the bar was estimated to be at a loss of, based on a preliminary draft. Additionally, he didn’t feel that he had the authority to release the full figures without the consent of the committee “as I have no more authority than anyone else on the committee.” He admits that the Bar is projected to make a loss of less than 50,000 euro, but insists that any figure he could provide would be inaccurate, “all we have is estimates for half a year – it’s July to December: six months – that’s all we have. I have a figure of that and we’re estimating the overall figure for the year based on a simple multiplication by two – but there are plenty of variables with the first and second half of the year, they do varying business. It would be wrong to try and guess any further.” He denied allegations that the Bar, including the wages of Bar staff, was directly funded by the Students’ Union in previous years due to a mismanagement of funds. However, he speculated that due to the manner through which the accounts were managed in the past, a possibility existed that money was lent between various different outlets, such as between the shops and the Union Corridor or vice-versa, which may have included the bars. “I’m expecting something to come back with a balance that’s owed between the various different entities that can be finalised. Potentially, there could have been a time in the past, a week or two weeks, when monies were paid, when the monies weren’t in the bar account. Certainly, they were never funded by the Union, even if they were administered via the Union – that money was the bar money. The Union never in any way subsidised wages for bar staff.” The University declined to comment on the matter.
Candidates for the position of Welfare Vice-President, Mícheál Gallagher and Enda Conway debating their manifestos at the UCDSU Hustings last week. Get everything you need to know in the University Observer’s Election Supplement Photographer: Brian O’Leary
Over 1,200 students march against cuts to allowances for new teachers by Katie Hughes · News Editor
Between 1,200 and 1,500 students took part in a protest on Wednesday February 22nd against cuts in allowances for new teachers. The Minister for Education and Skills, Ruairi Quinn, recently announced that allowances for new teachers would be suspended pending a review, which was expected to last up to one month. One of the organisers of the protest, William O’Brien stated that “The cuts that are being made now are going to lead to the segregation of the teaching profession – you’re going to have a teaching profession with teachers on four different types of salary scales and in the long run for both teachers, students and parents, this is in no one’s interest. The other aspect is that it’s a simple issue of fairness – to be asking teachers to do the exact same work for a significantly lesser amount of money, or less of a salary, is simply not fair – that’s our main point.” O’Brien further explained that secondary school teachers find it difficult to find full-time employment when they graduate, commenting that approximately ninety per cent of teachers
graduating next year will not find fulltime work, and will only find part-time “if they are lucky … when you’re talking about the starting salary for a teacher, that’s the starting salary of a full-time teacher. It’s definitely not the norm, it’s the rarity.” O’Brien stated that he contacted both USI and UCD Students’ Union regarding the protest but that he received no reply, “USI didn’t acknowledge what was going on whatsoever despite the fact that they were informed of what was going on and a phone call was made to myself as the protest was marching down O’Connell Street from USI saying they support us – I think that’s a little too late.” USI Deputy President Colm Murphy explained that he only heard about the protest on Monday evening, “It came up across my radar vary late but it certainly is something I would have supported. I wish it had come to us earlier as we could have done more to assist, but fair play to the students for getting out there and organising it.” UCD Students’ Union Campaigns and Communications Officer Bren-
dan Lacey insisted that he had not heard about the protest until contact was made by USI, “I received no communications from William, unless he contacted the front desk and the message wasn’t passed on – I certainly never got the message.” He stated that the Campaigns Officer of USI informed him on the day of the march that it was taking place “but by that point, there wasn’t much I could do to rally a campaign in terms of hours.” O’Brien re-affirmed the importance of the Minister’s decision, which is expected within a week, “allowances make up a significant proportion of a teacher’s salary, to suspend them without consultation with the Union, which is a normal practice, means that new teachers are just being utterly and unfairly targeted by the government – they’re an easy target because they’re a very small minority of the teaching profession. The protest was saying that enough is enough, new teachers have taken a significant pay cut already going back to the start of last year and the recent announcement was just a step too far.”
Despite the Societies Council’s current moratorium on new societies, the Academic Council Committee for Recognition of Student Societies has recently recognised two new societies: the Sinn Féin Society and the Indian Society. The moratorium in place was imposed by the Societies Council, not the Academic Council Committee for Recognition of Student Societies, who, according to committee member and Students’ Union President Pat de Brún, felt that regardless of the position of the Societies Council, they have the power to recognise or de-recognise societies, “that was the position adopted by Committee and we proceeded on that basis.” A policy was passed through Union Council two weeks ago mandating the President and the Students’ Union to oppose the moratorium and “we’ve been following that mandate,” stated de Brún, “with it in mind I made that position clear at the meeting and I’m delighted now that these new societies have been recognised.” De Brún recognises the “divergence of issues” between the Societies Council and the Academic Council Committee for Recognition of Student Societies, but insisted “societies have been recognised and will become official societies, that’s the end of the story.” Chairman of the Societies Council, Stephen Whelan, explained that the Societies Council was “forced” to impose the moratorium due to resource issues, which remains the case. He continued to say, “The Recognition Committee is fully informed of the position of the Council and has affirmed the different responsibilities of the two bodies.” The role of the Societies Council is with regard to the delivery of a “quality society experience by societies and for the members and the University”, while the Recognition Committee has the role of “dealing with applications from new societies.” Societies Officer Richard Butler explained that “the Council has discussed the issue in depth on several occasions, and ... there are quite serious space and resource issues there.” Butler is hopeful that “we are gradually moving towards being able to resolve some of [the issues]”, while Whelan states that the Council would hope to be in a position to lift the moratorium by the end of the year. It is unclear whether the newly recognised societies will receive funding or space in the Fresher’s tent as according to de Brún, “the moratorium does still make decisions regarding allocation of funding between all recognised societies and space in the Freshers’ tent.” Neither Butler nor Whelan would comment on the matter. The recognition of the Environmental Society is pending, but according to de Brún, “would be granted if they could improve their application from the first time around.”