General Meeting Motion Passed with Small Majority

By Rosanna Lloyd

On Tuesday 2nd February, the General Meeting took place between 12 and 2 in the Lemon Grove on Streatham Campus where a controversial sabbatical motion was passed by a tiny majority.

One of the initial motions put forward was the amendment to the advertising policy currently in place at Exeter University. It was noted that the Guild should take into account private society funding before allocating finance. This came under scrutiny when it was later suggested that budgeted income could be compromised by changes to the advertising policy. The opposition did argue that individual society sponsorship deals might benefit larger societies but smaller societies may lose out. The policy was subsequently passed.

The second motion was a push for better academic representation and an instruction to the Guild to hold earlier subject chair elections and training. This was easily passed with no opposition.

The final and most controversial motion was to limit sabbatical officers' terms to one term of 13 months and that if RON wins, a sabbatical officer can run for re-opened election. At this point in the meeting, Jon Cox, former Guild President who served two consecutive times in office, spoke up and argued that this motion would “stifle democracy”. After a lengthy debate, voting finally got under way in a secret ballot; the motion was passed by a mere 2 votes.

Voting for next year’s Sabbatical Officers will be open from 10am Friday 19 February to 4pm Friday 26 February and nominations remain open for another 2 weeks.