February 18th, 2010 | By President
The University of Western Sydney has suspended funding to the campus student organisation, The Hive, because it is “too political”, forcing a cancellation of all Oweek activities, according to student union President Jacob Carswell-Doherty. The Hive, created in 2009, at a substantial cost to the university and students, has been in full operation for six months and already disputes have arisen.
The Hive President said “there is no logical explanation for the freeze in funding except that UWS doesn’t like the current student group who were elected to run the organisation.”
“As a result of the funding freeze the student organisation has had to cancel all of its Oweek activities, the most important date for activities all year. What a ridiculous situation, UWS has been unfairly criticising us for not doing enough on campus activities, but is at the same time preventing us from running them” said the President.
At a meeting between UWS and the student union in January, the university complained that there were too many political campaigns and not enough on-campus activities; they also said that the SRC had spent too much money on one campus, Bankstown, and not others. “However when we presented detailed financial accounts to the university, proving this was not true, they continued to find other reasons to try and discredit our student organisation. Despite this, at that meeting UWS actually agreed to continue our funding and had just about finalised payments to the student organisation.”
And what are the political campaigns that have allegedly been alienating students and taking up all the union’s time? “The student union has been very much involved in the campaign for same-sex marriage rights, a campaign which something like 70% of young people support and I firmly believe this is the kind of thing student organisations should do” said the President.
“This campaign has cost the student organisation no more than $2000 in 2009 and meanwhile we’ve actually expanded the campus activities budget by around 160%, employing a full-time staff member to run activities and increasing funding for campus based activities.”
“Even after answering all of their questions and being as open as we can, UWS have now arbitrarily suspended funding, with no explanation, at a secret session of the university’s governing body” said Mr Carswell-Doherty adding further, “I’d really like to know what information was presented at that meeting for UWS to make such a rash decision.”
The situation is so serious that the board of the student union will have to decide early next week if the student organisation is actually solvent, if not it will have to be wound up and its four newly hired staff fired.
“There is nothing to base any decision to freeze funding upon.” The Hive is about to initiate its first independent audit by chartered accountants, with the details to be released in the coming months. “I am at a loss as to understand why the university would make a decision like this, before the audit has even been released.”
“It is disgraceful that UWS has expended public money to contract consultants to create a new student organisation only to force it in to an untenable financial position simply because they don’t like the students who were elected to run the organisation – they want their cake and to eat it too.”
For further comment please contact the Hive President – Jacob Carswell-Doherty on 0423 159 472
j.carswell-doherty@uws.edu.au
