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Salient. Victoria University Students' Newspaper. Volume Number 39, Issue 5. March 29 [1976]
Studass Fee
Studass Fee
Students' Association fees may rise by as much as $10 if everyone is to be satisfied at Wednesday's Annual General Meeting.
The motion to be debated suggests a rise of $6 50. but if it is decided that more money needs to be poured into the building fund this could rise even further.
The current debate on fee rises is confusing. It was started on 8 October last year when a Special General Meeting passed a motion by Sports Officer, Kevin Wright, supporting a fee rise of 50c (to $31.00) enabling Sports Council to operate a special account similar to that administered by Publications Board.
Sports Want More
In the past Sports Council's grant had been determined by the Executive at the beginning of each year (as was the Cultural Affairs grant). But Sports Council didn't believe that they were getting enough money, and didn't want their finances to be determined by the whims of a particular Executive.
| 1. | $7.50 ($9.00) to the Students' Assoc. General account. |
| 2. | $10.25 ($8.00) to the Student Union Maintenance account. |
| 3. | $8.00 ($8.00) to the Student Union Building Fund. |
| 4. | $1.00 ($1.00) to the Studass Trust. |
| 5. | $2.25 ($2.25) to be paid into a general account administered by the Publication's Board. |
| 6. | $2.00 (Nil) to be paid into a general account to be administered by Sports Council. |
Many students were annoyed with the somewhat 'cavalerish attitude' adopted by proponents of the motion to the reduction in the general account. Overall, this reduction amounted to $9000, which could however have been reduced by omitting the superfluous budgetting of $5000 (Sports Council Grant) and Easter and Winter Tournaments ($1600). Thus the net loss to the General Account would be $2500.
Where's the Money?
Where will the $2500 come from? Office salaries, superannuations, audit, and levies were all fixed. The answer, in the opinion of Association Secretary Peter Aagaard looks something like this:
| $600 | Donations to Pensioners' Association, Tenants' Protection Association, Vietnam Medical Aid Appeal etc. |
| $700 | Stationery. This would allow agendas, minutes, and other vital material to be printed. |
| $700 | Office expenses. This would cover repairs to the gestetener, typewriters, ribbons and stamps (if we had envelopes and paper). |
| $300 | Orientation. No Orientation. |
| $200 | Capping. With $200 from Capping we could even have a surplus of $100. |
Peter Aagaard, John Henderson and Gyles Beckford tried to do something about this situation by calling another Special General Meeting on 16 October last year. That meeting passed a motion putting the Association fee up to $32.50 to be dished out in the following way:
| $9.75 | to the General Account |
| $8.00 | to the Union Building Fund |
| $10.25 | to the Union Maintenance Account |
| $1.00 | to the Studass Trust. |
| $2.00 | to the Publications Board Account |
However, after consulting with the Association lawyers, it was decided that the second SGM was illegal because it was held out of term time and insufficient notice of the meeting had been given.
Council in on Act
Meanwhile, the University Council had decided that it didn't have time to sit around and work out which of the meetings was illegal, so it would only collect $30.50 (the 1975) fee). So, the Students' Association was even more in the Financial shit!
At the Annual General Meeting on Wednesday, the mess will be sorted out. The meeting will have to decide whether Sports Council is going to get their $2 per student and by how much we are to increase the studass fee to cover the money we didn't receive in 1976, the money we'll need to keep going in future years.
Be There 12 Noon Wednesday in the Union Hall.
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