A grubby display of political expediency soured the good news announced at its Extraordinary General Meeting that the Student Travel Bureau ended up with a profit of over $17,000 for the 1978 financial year. The chairman of the Bureau's board of directors, John Judge, said in his report that this profit had been achieved despite spending of over $15,000 in scaling down the company's operations and represented "an excellent result"'. He added that the full effects of the board's actions would continue to be felt throughout the current year.

Mr Judge expressed concern, though, at the board's vulnerability because its membership is subject to continual change. He said this was a particular problem this year as "with my impending departure overseas, no 'non-executive' board member has more than one year's experience". The election of a replacement board member was to come up later in the meeting (the springboard for the grubbiness mentioned, but more of that later) and Mr Judge said that the board believed caution should be exercised in that election.

"It is my personal belief that to elect a recent 'student politician' with little or no business experience would be a disastrous mistake and that it is better to elect nobody if there is no candidate with suitable experience," he said. "To help overcome this problem the board is approaching a senior member of the travel industry to serve on the board in addition to the three 'student' elected members. This will provide the board with a level of continuity and expertise not presently available and will help the company to consolidate from our present base."

New Board Members Elected

After the presentation of the company's audited accounts, the meeting moved on to the election of a replacement student director. There were candidates for the positon, Phil Chronican and Graham Bowers.

Phil Chronican, president of Otago University Students' Association in 1978, said that he had made a report on STB last year, and considered that he understands the workings of the company as much as anyone presently on the board.

Dave Perry from Canterbury University quoted Mr Judge's comments regarding "student politicians" and asked Phil if he thought these were applicable to him. "I would like to think I would be considered for my administrative abilities rather than my political beliefs," Phil replied.

Peter Beach asked Phil to what extent, as a student representative, he would feel bound to carry out a decision of an SGM in his workings on the board. "I would feel duty bound to follow it," Phil replied, "unless it conflicted with my legal responsibilities to the company." He had earlier mentioned the legal onus on the director of a company not to act against the interests of the company.

Graham Bowers, currently the accountant for the Auckland University Students' Association, was asked by Simon Wilson the same question Peter Beach had put to Phil Chronican and replied that he would feel bound by any decision of an SGM.

Board member Stephen Underwood asked Graham if he saw the possibility of any conflict between his position at Auckland University and the position of director. "Perhaps a personal conflict," Graham replied, "but no more than a board member who sits on two or three boards or is on the board and has a separate job."

Board Member Sacked

The two candidates retired and the grubbiness began. It was decided that because both people would be excellent board members, present student director Nigel Petrie, who supposedly had not been working as hard as he should have, would be rolled and Chronican and Bowers would be elected to replace him and Judge. Sure, if Nigel hadn't been doing the job he had been elected to do, he should have been replaced, but certainly not in the manner that he was.

President of Massey University Students' Association, Felicite Jardine, started the ball rolling (excuse the pun) by saying that a picture was being built up that things were not as good as they seemed on the board. "Specifically I'm not happy with the way Nigel is working. He has had a year on the board now but he is not shaping up to the job," she said.

The directors, excluding Chris Gosling, withdrew from the meeting at this stage, saying it was "unreasonable" for them to be expected to pass judgement on one of their fellow board members. Chris then told the meeting that in his personal opinion Nigel's performance on the board "has been less than adequate".

"He has attended most meetings but his contribution has been very small. In simple terms he has said very little and what he has said has not covered any new ground or raised any new facts." Chris said that he had come onto the board "more ignorant" than Nigel but considers that he has done more than him in that time. "We have two good candidates for election and I think both these should be appointed and Petrie's appointed terminated. And that's not said lightly," he added

No Warning Given

Helen Aikman however voiced her disapproval at the way in which the whole situation was being handled, saying that it was neither "the time or the place" to discuss it. "It should have come up at National Exec," she said. "We came along here to elect one member to the board and when the candidates were out of the page 9 room we were informed that moves were afoot to roll one of the present members."

Tony Stuart from Canterbury agreed that the matter should have been raised at National Executive, adding that "there's something a bit smelly about the whole thing". He said later though that in his experience Nigel did not seem to have been doing his job well enough.

Simon Wilson made a plea for some decency in the matter and said that Nigel should be given time to think about the allegations being made about him and be allowed to resign if he wanted to, "rather than informing him in the morning and then by barely 12 o'clock be passing motions of no confidence in him".

Nigel was called back into the meeting to give a chance to defend himself. He said that the reason he had taken little part in discussions on accounting matters was because of a lack of experience. He had tried to visit the various campuses, one of his responsibilities as a student representative on the board, and had been to several.

Paul Gourlie of Otago asked him if he considered the other members of the board were trying to push him out, but Nigel replied that he did not think the issue was a personality one. He did think he had not been involved in the running of the organisation as much as the other board members, but he said this was more of a "communication problem" than ostracism. (Is there a difference?).

After some further questioning Nigel again left the meeting and a motion calling for his removal from the board of STB was carried. Instead of the matter being dealt with in a manner demanded by its seriousness if nothing else, expediency had ruled. You can judge whether or not it was ok.

No doubt in recognition of this, Margaret Underwood said that Victoria would like to express its concern at the way the situation was handled, especially the lack of notice given.

After that, the elections were something of an anti-climax. Graham Bowers was elected for a three year term to replace John Judge and Phil Chronichan was elected for a one year term replacing Nigel.

Mark Wilson.