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This is YOUR Union

 Every student at Newcastle is a member

 

 

 

This is YOUR Union!

This May saw the biggest shake up of the Newcastle’s Union since time began, well since 1926 anyway. The referendum over 13^th to the 15^th of May gave every Newcastle student the chance to vote on how the Union will be run for the next 82 years (or more importantly how it’s going to run from next year!)

Now obviously when you’ve got 18,000 members it’s not easy to please everyone, that’s why for the last two years the elected Union Officers have been trying to canvass opinion and student feelings on the performance of your Union; culminating in the Strategic Review that over a thousand of you filled out.

The proposal put forward by the current officers is designed to change the way the Union works. This means how things happen on a day to day basis as well as how the Union should engage its members to represent them the way they want to be represented.

On the 13^th of May the final proposal passed a campus referendum, but what’s a referendum?  “A referendum is a process that makes sure all members get their chance to have a say on the big issues that affect them while they are a part of the Union.” Jamie McDonnell Union President 2007-08 

Ok so that’s clear now….but what has this governance proposal changed? The Union has had a pretty traumatic decade and is in the process of recovering from a financial slump of epic proportions. This governance change is designed to stop things like this happening. The governance structure of the Union meant that many people had a say on issues like Union finances, despite having no financial expertise or experience. However many of these people were not accountable when things went wrong.

If this sounds unfair to you, then you’re not alone, the Charity Commission is also keen of Charities cleaning up their corporate governance systems, especially the once exempt Student Union sector. The new proposal means that the working practices of Students’ Union organisations have been separated to ensure as many students as possible can get involved in representing students, while not unknowingly signing their life away.

It also gives everyone involved in the Union a more defined role which means they can pursue exactly the reasons why they got involved; be it from representing a school to running a society to being a part time officer. The commercial side of the building will remain not for profit (with all the money made going back into the building) and become slicker and more efficient with checks by students to make sure that what entertainment is on is what Newcastle students want.

The democratic side will also be easier to understand and will be able to react much more quickly to what Newcastle Students want, when they want it. It also means that students will get to be accurately represented by their elected officers as officers will get more chances to listen to what Newcastle students want.

 

All Union Society governance documents can be found here.

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