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UCD Students’ Union Council rejects motion to rehire the fired Copy Bureau staff
A motion to rehire the SU staff fired in December, and to re-open the Students’ Union Copy Bureau, has failed to pass Students’ Union Council, with only four representatives voting in favour of the proposal.
The motion, which was debated at Council last night, noted that “the SU Print Bureau is a vital service for both faculty and students in UCD”, and that “the way in which the Union handled the laying off of long serving SU staff members two weeks before Christmas and leaving students, during exams, without a decent print service reflects badly on the Union as a whole.” The motion further proposed that “the SU Print Bureau along with the SU staff members laid off before Christmas are reinstated as soon as possible and the SU financial shortfall is made up elsewhere without any impact on education or welfare. If it is claimed that money cannot come from elsewhere, the accounts (in detail) should be made public.”
Karl Gill, who proposed the motion, stated, “People come here for an education. Our priority is to safeguard education. As for everything else, we can have a smaller ball this year if needs be … we can do away with class rep training if needs be, if that’s the issue, but we have to protect education above everything else.”
The motion was defeated overwhelmingly when brought to a vote. As a result, the SU have no immediate plans to return the fired staff to their previous positions. This comes in the wake of a meeting held on campus yesterday to discuss resistance to the job losses.
During the debate, UCDSU President Pat de Brún stated, “We’re facing an absolutely unprecedented and historic crisis in the SU. This isn’t anyone in this room’s fault, and it’s certainly not the staff members who were faced with redundancy’s fault. I’m not saying that it is. But this situation is so serious that if it’s not addressed, the entire future of the Union is at risk. We’re in debt of over a million euro. Our services are making big losses. This was something that if we didn’t do it now we would possibly not have a Union to come back to within a year or two.
“These decisions are horrible. They are the most difficult thing that you could ever be asked to do, to sit down in front of a group of long-serving, hard-working, and loyal staff, and tell them there are no longer jobs there for them. That is something that has had to happen. I can promise you this is something that has not been taken lightly. It was something that was an absolute last resort, and it was something that was done to safeguard the future of the Union, and jobs across the Union.”
De Brún stated that the SU accounts will be available for release “in a few short weeks.” Planned resistance to cuts in jobs and services is ongoing.
Olaf
January 26, 2012 at 12:22 pm
“These decisions are horrible” – well here’s one that would’ve been easier De Brun, you could’ve subtracted the money needed to run the Copy Bureau from the pay of the SU sabbatical officers, or even taken the necessary money for it from the funds for supposedly training class reps that are never seen or heard from after the first week of term. In all the time I’ve been in UCD the helpful, friendly staff of the Copy Bureau have done more for me than any sabbatical officer or class rep. I doubt I’m the only person who feels this way.
Sean
January 27, 2012 at 11:53 am
@Olaf
You have some ridiculous notions about how much Sabbatical Officers make, and UCD Officers are the lowest paid in the country.
The sabbatical officer is paid a salary of between 18-22k and it is well known that UCD Officers actually receive less than the minimum wage in salary which is in contradiction to the National Minimum Wage Act 2000.
Also Rep Training costs nowhere near 30-40k a year so it wont make up the shortfall.
The fact of the matter is, as sad as it is, is that the Copy Bureau is and has been a loss making business and with the Students’ Union in over €1 million debt, cuts have to happen.
Also the counter argument to take it out of the Ents Budget is invalid because they will be doing this already because of the enormous size of the debt.
Olaf
January 28, 2012 at 3:58 pm
@Sean
Fair enough, I accept your point that such cuts may not make up the shortfall but I still stand by the core point of what I said which is this – cuts should always be made at the top first before frontline services are sacrificed. The Copy Bureau staff didn’t put the Union 1 million in debt, SU officers past and present did.
Manus
February 1, 2012 at 10:18 am
How did a students’ union get so badly in debt? Did they cook the books like the Greek government?
And why, out of students’ subs amounting to €700,000, can’t they find enough money to keep on two members of staff and a printing service? You can have something that’s making a financial loss but nonetheless serves a distinct social good. I never make a financial profit on eating my dinner :-p
Pat de Brun going on about how it was a “horrible horrible horrible but necessary” decision. Pathetic. Opening the books and restructuring the debt would be “horrible but necessary.” Sacking two long-serving staff members who provide a vital service should not even be on the table
Manus
February 1, 2012 at 10:21 am
First official act of UCD SU Ltd
How did it come to this? I’ve been trying to find out, how did they rack up all that debt? Should all of it be paid back?