A proposal brought forward by Student Union President George Nuttall to restructure the roles of the FTO roles has passed in an Executive Committee Meeting. The committee voted seven in favour of the proposal, five against and one abstention.
At the matter stands, no referendum will take place.
The structure will be introduced in time for the FTO Officer elections due to take place in Week Eight of Lent Term.
Under the proposed new structure, the Full-Time Officer team will consist of:
• President
• Vice-President (Union Development)
• Vice-President (Education)
• Vice-President (Welfare)
• Vice-President (Societies and Media)
• Vice-President (Sports)
The passing of the proposal will oversee the abolition of some of the current Full-Time Officer roles including VP Campaigns and Communications and VP Activities.
Livestreamed by the Student Union, many students voiced their opinion in the comment section. Benji Holmes said, ‘If you do a referendum and no one votes, then you have the mandate to make this decision without student consultation.’
Another, Sophie Edwards said, ‘Not letting students vote for what happens to their society is a failed display of democratic process. More and more students are becoming politically involved in what is going on with our student experience. Societies are a big part of that. And as a first-year student, I want to be able to vote for what happens to my societies because they make up my experience in accordance to LUSU.’
On the other hand, Lancaster University Refugee Scholarship Campaign stated, ‘Glad to hear that our student refugee scholarship campaign gets a mention by Grishma the VP welfare and community.’
Vice-President Hannah Prydderch spoke to SCAN following the meeting and said:
‘I’d like to thank all of the students who expressed their views before the meeting. It’s crucial that students get their voices heard and I wish we had more time to widely discuss it.’
Hannah Prydderch
President of the Student’s Union George Nuttall gave SCAN the following statement:
‘I am happy that the Executive accepted my proposed changes to the
George NuttallFull Time Officer team –hopefully this will result in greater support for the 6000 students who engage in our nearly 200 societies. Student Media will continue to operate with the same level of operational support and political representation in Union whilst also increasing the level of representation of our societies. There was a vigorous debate about it with a variance of opinion and gives us a chance to try something different before a more comprehensive review of our democratic structures, which will include a constitutional convention giving students a chance to feed into this process.’
This is an ongoing story.
