A bit of salt, a bit of pepper... let's stir things up a bit!!!

You students made me laugh....

"Relocation of the student services group currently in the east basement to the 2nd floor"

be interesting to know where on the 2nd floor...none of its really relocationable and its all pretty heavily used space.(the present 2nd floor that is)

Nice to see the students have been consulted about what they want from the building before pen was put to paper. I suppose this is all part of the new "consultative" ICU - the powers that be consult, but don't actually need to listen to students because they've already made up their minds and obviously they know best.

And what the hell is the point of a Council Chamber anyway? Waste of space if ever I heard it.

If your hacked off with not being listened to then why not go to Union Council on Tuesday, and make your views heard.

As for the council chamber - guess it's so would be or failed politicians can enjoy boosting their ego.

I hardly think the building contractors are waiting with hammers at the ready, but if they have been called into the equation a better article would've been 'Sabbs get something done'.

Surely the picture in the article should have red leather benches, rather than green. Take off the 's' and what do you have????

"'Sabbs get something done'"

• but without consulting the students.

The union have asked estates to run a competition to get a masterplan and paid £20k for this plan. The architects want to win the contract and so will do what is detailed in the masterplan.

Essentially the union will get a load of useless plans with "council chambers", and we will have wasted £20k because the students have not been consulted. - Fantastic.

Why consult students? They dont anything and probably wont suggest anything useful.

The Union is on the right track and when I become ICU President, I will make sure that absolutely no consultation takes place.

Tee hee hee

Just building up a picture here.....

"at which it was decided to channel £20,000 destined to refurbish the union foyers towards the cost of producing the plan. "

Do you mean £20,000 was originally marked down to be spent on the Union foyers and has now been diverted from the foyers to this masterplan? Any idea who made the original decision to spend £20000 on Union foyers?

You will find there are both a house and maintenance budget for the union.

House is allocated by students, at House Ctte, and Maintenance is allocated by the DPFS.

The £30k had been destined for the foyers as part of the union refurb scheme, however the Sabs decided this was not necessary so moved the money to pay for the masterplan. By the time Exec met (with Sabs and FU Presidents) the money had been given to Estates, so all Exec could do was rubber stamp the move by the Sabs.

Basically a fast one was pulled by our elected sab officers over the summer.

And seeing as you didn't know before today shows that they didn't really explain what they had done to people.

Sorry I mean £20k not £30k - typo...

Random Stduent and Nia,

Look at the link to the paper in the article - section 7.

The Management & Planning Group have recommended that:

(a) £20,000 be allocated from the 2004-05 Executive Reserve to cover

market research and facilitation of the consultation process; and

(b) £20,000 be allocated from the 2003-04 underspend on the House

Committee and general repairs and maintenance budgets to cover

architects fees for developing the masterplan.

MPG is an unminuted meeting group of sabs and senior union staff.

The point is that student consultation HAD been sought, but clearly was not to be considered in making these decisions: the number of student hours that must have been spent completing the questionnaire section on the Union Building at Beit Quad (which I was specifically told not to leave out of the Wye-specific questionnaire, they wanted as many views as possible on that section, even a couple of Wye students who went there once a year even at the risk of annoying every other Wye student with another whole page of London-only questions) must run into hundreds of hours.

Come to think of it, there was going to be a Union Building Users Focus Group, but this was ditched at the last minute because "it wasn't possible to define a suitable membership for that group." So that was nearly another 50 hours wasted, not to mention any time spent on that subject by the groups of SAC members, club members, random students etc.

The point is that if decisions had been made, students should have been made aware of this: they should not have been offered the chance to "get their voices heard" when their voices would not be heard.

At the last Council meeting, we were told that the plans would be written once the survey data and focus group results had been compiled. That was November 30th. If the document had a November 2004 date on it, this must mean the results were compiled and the master plan written overnight. Impressive.

I realise that the building plan is just one part of the review, and student views may be considered in other aspects, but it is a fairly central part, probably the most expensive, and surely the balance of space usage and the balance of areas of activity are very closely linked?

(PS. Shrenik, no campaigning before close of nominations or we might just get you disqualified...)

It frees up the East Basement for the Sabs nuclear bunker.

Dear Hacked Off,

It seems that the Union has taken on an ever more starkly disjointed and kafkaeque beauracracy than in my heyday.

Now departed, would you like to take on the roll of writing council sketches?

I could do, however I fear that this messageboard would not be the same without your cynical yet insightful input.

I shall change my name to NewlyHackedOff and any such confusion between your good self and I will be dispelled.

Back to the topic - Union accountability: hasn't it got worse since private meetings such as MPG have occurred more frequently and these private invite-only groups started adopting powers that used to be reserved for elected bodies without actually asking permission to do this from REAL Union committees BEFORE they do it? Isn't accountability even more difficult when the minutes of these meetings aren't accessible to all students (or even just Council or Exec for that matter) and the minutes of the meetings that ARE accessible neatly cover up who said what, who pushed for what and whose crackpot idea it was in the first place by containing very little real information? Doesn't this remove any individual responsibility on the part of students on these committees? Doesn't it also remove one's ability to see what part staff play in these meetings?

Isn't this culture of secrecy just further removing ICU from its members by removing their ability to have any real impact of decision-making and accountability?

Is the reason that ICU is now so secretive because they are trying to cover something up or push something through before students have a chance to stop it?

And why did the Strategic Review group that was proposed and accepted by Exec have so few current students on it?

And with those to mull over now I shall bid you toodle pip!

I think you will find that the union are planning to abolish the Union Gym, and also the changing rooms. In the plan it says it will be replaced with offices....

The Advisory Group has a member from every Faculty and Campus Union- I've certainly been discussing it all with the LifeSci and WCUS Execs, and if anyone asked to look at the minutes I wouldn't think twice about showing them. Admittedly this leaves gaps with some CSCs, as someone heavily involved in running a CSC wouldn't necessarily have time to go to their Faculty Union's meetings. But bear in mind that this group, decided by Exec (admittedly an Exec which itself only has 4 current students at present), approved by Council (albeit a Council which at the time was 11 OMs short) is only consulted about details of how others should be consulted- not about the contents of reports or plans, that's all down to Exec (in theory) or MPG (apparently in practice): when Exec has 5 voting members who are on MPG and only 3 who are not, this is probably the biggest shortfall in acoountability, however hard those 3 might try.

As for covering things up and pushing thinsg through before students havinga chance to stop it, the Exec paper quoted in this article does say that ICU should adapt to the ways of Imperial College under Richard Sykes...

Only a year and half to go before I can leave!

I hear a few union officers are getting a little bit worried about tommorrow night.

And so they should be....

But where will Council be held? The website is less than helpful about the venue.

I know - don't tell anyone where it is and then they can't turn up! Brilliant!

From my continuing possition in the union office, (And having avoided Sam's Fly Swat), I can distinctly smell the smell of officer fear in Beit Towers (Either that or the Union Office Christmas Party consisted of a hellish curry that is fighting back).

lolol. Is this how they hope to argue the necessity for a House of ICU Council Chamber?

>> UNION COUNCIL

>> 7pm START

>> UNION DINING HALL

>> BEIT QUAD

The problem with getting student input is that too many students don't care enough to give feedback and the time taken to get feedback means that it largely makes it impossible for feedback to be used for everything. Just look at the survey, less than 1000 completed in it's [extended] timescale...

Yes but making decesions before stduents were even consulted is just WRONG.

1000 people is fairly good really - and after all do you really want to spend 1 hour filling out a form. You couldn't even fill parts out one page at a time....

Also before anyone slags me off for not bringing this to anyones attention at the time - I DID.

And I was ignored.....

Simon, the time scale offered initially was very small and indeed it seemed strange.

If such an important matter needs to be discussed, the period of discussion needs to be long and varied.

If the Sabbs have been under the impression that the students do not care, then perhaps they should question their own election and in particular their achivements, perhaps they haven't done enough to ensure that the union is relevant to its student OR you can take the other argument, is it a perception that anyone else outside the "inner circle" of power and influence has a brain size of some minute object and cannot comprehend the "complicated" process albeit question of what the Union stands for or should stand for in the future.

1000 was the number who actually completed the whole however-many pages. The figure who started the survey and then had something else to do was nearer 3000, or possibly 3500.

The number of people who started it is also a little misleading though. I 'started' it about 10 times but after it repeatedly error messaging me or logging me out after about 20 minutes working o it i just gave up...

Having seen the fabled 'Masterplan' and the questionaire its amazing how the questions (Which always appeared leading anyway) fit exactly with what the plan says. A cynic might say that the purpose of the questions was to rubber stamp the plans and not to find out what was actually wanted.

A even greater cynic might suggest that the difficulties in filling in the questionaire and making it so tediously long (And the clubs and societies chair questionaire was no better) were deliberate so that evidence to suggest that people did not like the 'ideas' (Or perhaps its better to say plans) put forward in the questionaire would not be gathered and the union could steam roller through its plans regardless of what people thought.

Turn up to council and make your views heard.

If we get 200 people we can have an EGM.

Rumour has it that ICU are laying on extra stewards tonight for council...

Sounds like they're expecting a riot!

Good good,

Maybe they have finally got the message - they may want a room with a capacity of around 200..... Is the UCh free?

As long as a path is kept free so I can get to the bar during the meeting I don't care where its held.

Can someone send a cleaner up to these offices? The smell is getting really bad and its attracting flies who are making me feel inscure as the only true fly on the wall.

(Although the company makes a change, and who knows, I might find a partner and increase the numbers of highly trained listening flies who could bring far more important news to the masses, the down side been that extra flies means a higher probability of one been caught in Sam's fly swat and thus more time spent at eracnid funerals.)

Well hold it in the UCH and you might get over 200 people, and oppourtunity for ice creams...however most people may ask you to shut up during the films ;)

With no place for council which can seat over 200 people - where will we hold Council???

Db's???

The Quad?

...The Council Chamber?

I think Ant means Council is on in the uDh whilst FilmSoc are in the uCh.

Live! has just learnt that the Union has infact hired out external Stewarding for this event due to lack (or unavailability) of tradition green dressed Union stewards.

if at first you don't succeed, intimidate?

what will we need to pay to get in?

Ah, so the Emperor has got himself a praetorian gaurd...

I suppose someone agreed to this expenditure?

It sounds like the Sabbs are spending money like water:

New staff: £50,000

Architects quotes: £20,000

Strategic review recomending a Council Chamber: Priceless.

Only it turned out not to be a joke.

It is good to see Council get their spine back....

Isn't that what Mr Arif wanted last year?

I had thought that having spent the day s**ting themselves the sabbs would have nothing more to s**t out, but sure enough El Presidente had gallons of it coming out of his mouth regarding the strategic review

I just can't wait to hear the audio transcript of the discussions about the origins of the err masterplan umm it err will mmm yes you see err um completely not err final or um binding in any way err ad nauseam

mildly amusing that the document included a plan view of the first floor (present) layout twice...once labelled as first floor and once as second floor.

Humourous quote from it is 'stored elsewhere' about the staging for dBs..what they planning on doing putting cargo containers in the quad?

mwah ha ha haaa

• Official Statement from the embassy of flies -

It is with great regret that we have to announce the untimely death of Fly on the Wall. Having dedicated the best part of his life to reporting union matters that many would have rather had remained private to the masses it would appear that he is missing in action, assumed dead.

It is believed that his demise was not due to the fly swat of Sam, nor the swinging of empty Riocca bottles by Rich, nor by Mustafa throwing Mike the Micrometer across the room following a recent council meeting and not even by Sameena dropping a large pile of invoices from relativly little height.

The death is due to chemical poisoning following the recent cleaning of the union after the mass bowel loosening prior to the recent council.

We are sure that Fly on the Wall will be missed, but rest assured we will be replacing him shortly.

Yours Faithfully

Son of Fly

To the tune of 'my way'

And Now, the fly is dead,

why did you have, to go and leave us?

The truth, you always told, despite the risk, that finally killed you,

You never lied, for truth you died,

such a guide, for future flies,

and through it all, not one dishonest call,

You told it your way!'

With fly gone who is going to expose the truth? Without him we would not have known about budgetgate at the freshers ball, soverflowings**tgate last week, dram-soc actually-working-hard-gate at the LMS, tafagate during the strategic review or the garden gate that someone nicked from a dramsoc set.

Rest in Piece Mr Fly

I think the passing of the fly is long overdue, especially as his cover has been blown and we all know who he really is!

Yeah John, but you only know cos I told u! On the very morning before I told you you still asked 'who is that' to one of my posts.

It has been noticed that the Union website still has no details of the Consititution, though the paper that was passed exactly a week ago mandated the Council Chair to restore the constitution to its former glory, or at least a pdf copy within a week of passing the paper.

Lateness of papers?

I hope this tardiness is not reflected in the supply of information the President is expected to produce by the next Council meeting, which includes an explanation about the so-called "Masterplan", and an APOLOGY to Council...

In other news

The Union bars are offering real ale at exceptionally keen prices owing to surplus stock for one night only! Hooray!

Has anybody read tonight's Evening Standard? Check out the "Ultimate Makeover" on Page nine...

Or alternatively you can read it here...

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/londonnews/articles/15471803?source=Evening%20Standard

Sitting here 'across the pond' i find it heartwarming to see that ICU has finally caught up with the mordern world and become a true leader in democracy.

I refer you to the following points:

Closed meetings to discuss matters considered important to members of the 'union'

'Interpretting' of the constitution to fit with the desires of the elected members

Alleged interference in policy making by non-elected parties

and finally we now have a flag flying over the entrance,

i do hope you all remember to pledge alliegence as you enter ICU.

Awaiting the UCL WMD crisis.