Present: SWC (Chair), JC (Vice-President), EM (President), SP (SRO), WE (Stool), BT (JRO), SG (JRO)
Apologies:
Absent: KB (JRO)
Campus Card Entry Motion
SWC: They want to spend some money on campus card entry to the music room.
*No comments or issues*
Exec Elect Campaign Teams Motion
SWC: It says that exec elect shouldn’t be able to be on campaign teams.
SP: Does it include gov comm? SRO is elected quite early.
SWC: I don’t think that’s what it’s about. It’s expected that gov comm will be impartial. But you could propose that as an amendment.
*No further comments*
Black Lives Matter Motion
SWC: This went to finance comm because it involves money. They recommended that it be split into two motions, one for the £824 this year and one for the regular £50. They also recommended a time scale so that the donation would be reviewed after a period.
EM: While it’s good, and we would assume it will be repassed, we shouldn’t decide without reviewing every few years.
SWC: I then recommended that we pass a motion to ensure that all ongoing donations will be reviewed after a set number of years. But that doesn’t impact this motion. The proposer doesn’t want to split the motion, and I won’t force him. He sees it as all linked. If anyone wants to propose a procedural motion, they can do it in the meeting.
EM: Can we run the motion about reviewing beforehand?
SWC: We can, but motions are only effective from the end of the meeting and he’s included a timescale. My motion will be an automatic review time of 2 years, but it can be higher. This motion will be for a review after 5 years.
EM: I’m in favour of the cause, but 5 years from now there won’t really be anyone here who made those decisions. I think if we set a precedent, there could be more like this.
SWC: I think allowing the freedom to choose how often it’s reviewed is important. All these motions go through JCR meetings, and can be amended in the meeting.
EM: I think this is a more worth cause than some that might come our way, I just prefer the idea of a definitive timescale.
SWC: There’s nothing procedurally problematic in the motion.
DA International Rep
WE: He says he aims for greater racial diversity, but isn’t that out of his control?
SP: I agree, and it needs to be more focussed. Perhaps he means in students who interact with the JCR.
KM Student Trustee
*No issues*
JP Student Trustee
SP: It’s more than one page. Any other issues?
SWC: He can’t make sure the trustees say yes to any request.
EM: Protect the Bailey at all costs is propaganda based on a rumour. It’s inaccurate in what it perpetuates. There’s no battle so it’s not a promise he can make.
SP: I’ll get him to remove it.
*No further issues*
SP Student Trustee
BT: It’s missing the signature.
SWC: It’s quite vague, but I don’t think there’s anything that’s not allowed.
SP: I agree, there’s nothing that’s a violation or is misleading.
*No further issues*
RSD Student Trustee
*No issues*
Joke meeting
SWC: I’m not convinced that there should be any non-joke motions. People don’t turn up because they think it’s just a joke. I think it would be better to just stick to joke motions.
SP: I concur. But I have some motions that I won’t get another opportunity to pass.
SWC: I think it should either be a joke meeting or not.
SP: If the main concern is that people don’t know that this is how it will be, maybe just make that clearer? But also, usually a lot of people have left Durham by the meeting, but online there might be more people.
EM: Maybe we should say the first half hour will be serious, then encourage people to stick around.
SWC: I’m happy with that for this year.
JC: WE we do online voting? I’m concerned that some people will just click yes for everything, but they’ll be some motions that really shouldn’t be passed.
SWC: We could separate joke motions in the meeting, and have non jokes voted online, and then joke motions in the meeting.
*Agreement*
JC: How will we run the Wincrete Memorial Trophy?
EM: We’ll tell people to bring soda water.
SWC: I really don’t care about this.
EM: I’ve just lost all faith in you as a chair.
Offensive Jokes in Husts
SP: Recently a candidate made an inappropriate joke during a hust. This leads us to need to consider how we would respond. Because criticising it could be considered negative campaigning.
EM: Would we stop them in their hust? Or maybe respond afterwards?
SWC: I think ideally they should be stopped immediately, but if not say something afterwards. I think they should also be disqualified from the election because it’s against the code of conduct. But maybe we need a clearer provision.
JC: I agree with SWC, but I think we should make sure that our election rules allow us to do that.
SP: I’m working on a motion that addresses this.
SWC: I’m not convinced it needs to be in our rules. They should just be in our election rules.
EM: Equally there’s no harm in saying that gov comm can disqualify a candidate based on misconduct. Also, some jokes are more obvious to some people than others. There could be circumstances where the issue isn’t so clear. There should also be a process. Gov comm might not realise something is offensive. What if someone else wants to stand up and complain about what they said?
SWC: If the SRO has the power to stop them in that moment, JCR members could speak to the SRO. I think the SRO should have the power to stop someone mid hust if something is obviously offensive. We can have all the rules we want, but it might not stop people.
EM: I think it is reasonable for us at least to say that we’ve thought about this issue and decided what we do in that situation.
SWC: We do currently have the power to stop people who make offensive comments, it’s just less clearly defined.