On the steps of House 6, at 5pm today, Monday October 6th, Buster Whaley, the Education Officer of the Trinity College Dublin Students’ Union (TCDSU), announced that the referendum concerning representation of postgraduate students and the referendum concerning the SU’s relationship with the University Times were both approved.
The referendum concerning the University Times was passed with 2,112 votes for, 1,130 against, and 1,320 abstained, passing with 56 per cent in favour of the 4,568 votes cast. The University Times spoke to Harper Alderson, campaign manager for the “No” campaign, after the announcement. Alderson offered the following comment:
“The union is able to carry out its activities as such because it claims it has a democratic mandate. However, a necessary condition of possibility for a democracy is an enlightened electorate. The electorate, in this particular election, was not given the opportunity to fully understand the implications of the referendum, from the wording of the referendum, [to] the way it was popularised [by the Union]. [This was] a major oversight by the Students’ Union and is a structural issue in the Students’ Union in general.”
She added, “Nothing materially changes under the passing of this referendum. Only an extra layer of bureaucracy that will amount to nothing. This referendum will mean that, for the future, the UT Editor is accountable only on paper and will never actually be accountable because impeachment is [basically] impossible under the Constitution.” In addition to being the manager of the “No” campaign, Alderson is also the Deputy Editor of the University Times.
The Editor of the University Times, Charlie Hastings, commented: “As much as I agree with making my position impeachable, the rest of these new rules and regulations will do nothing but hurt the newspaper. This will do nothing but hurt journalism on campus. I think anyone who wants free and fair journalism to continue to be accessible to them as Trinity students should have definitely voted no for this… It’s a shame that they didn’t.”
With the change to the TCDSU constitution, the position of the Editor of the University Times is now impeachable by the Union. The Editor may only speak at council when requested to do so. The Editor is also now required to offer a monthly report to the council, and may be censured by vote of the TCDSU council.
The other referendum held at the same time was a referendum regarding the representation of postgraduate students within TCDSU. The referendum passed with 87 per cent in favour, with 2,888 votes for, 395 against and 1285 abstaining.
Included now in the TCDSU constitution is a new full-time sabbatical officer position, the Graduate Officer. This position codifies the roles of the Postgraduate Taught Officer and the Postgraduate Research Officer, and changes when they are elected. It also replaces Faculty/School and Deputy Faculty/School Convenors with Undergraduate and Postgraduate Faculty/School Convenors respectively.
According to the figures released by the TCDSU, a record number of 4,568 ballots were cast in this vote (approximately 27 per cent of eligible voters), the highest figure in the known history of the SU.
