But what about staff?

Does he care about staff?

Won't someone please think about the staff?

The staff can pay for it out of their saleries...

after all, it's well known that academic salaries are very high in comparison to, say, circle line tube drivers who get 36,000 a year.

I think Sir Richard should get it for free, as I'm not sure share options will be redeemable at the till should he want to go swimming.

The fitness gym and swimming pool in the new sports centre will, indeed, by free to all students and staff at Imperial College. We were supposed to keep this quiet (the Union Exec knew) but if the College's new Director of Communications has already pre-empted the announcement with that letter in Felix then there remains very little point.

Interesting that the Union was supposed to keep it all quiet. I find that strange, but can't describe why...

One wonders what else they [exec] know that other people don't...

I strongly support the idea that College can communicate with the Union Management in confidence. Very often it is necessary due to the sensitivity or uncertainty of things being discussed. The Executive Committee is the most important part of the Union Managment.

If ICU wants to be trusted and respected by College and be a useful partner in a productive business relationship then it needs to continue to respect this.

If ICU behave like a bunch of gossips, then it can't expect to be consulted on crucially important issues like halls, libraries, teaching... etc...

Simon,

I think the emphasis was on the fact that college have told everyone rather than the union....

Oh? That's not how I read it.

The Union management knew but were treating it as confidential.

College decided to release the information.

The only thing that has happened is that the Union actually managed to keep it's mouth shut long enough on this occassion!

Hurrah!

So will ground hire for C&S also be free?!

It seems you already know the answer...

"There will be increased charges for clubs and societies to use the sports hall space, but this will be much less than the cost to the college of providing the free fitness gym and swimming pool."

Bother. So either the union will have to up its allocation for ground hire in next years budget, or club membership will go up considerably for all clubs who use the sports centre facillities.

Where did you get that quote from???

Our president in his column in Felix today. The deputy rector says much the same thing in his interview:

"We're actually freeing individual students from having to pay membership fees for certain activities, which will increase the amount ofresources that students have available to them. Clubs will have to say, well, if students wish to participate in certain group activities then maybe they will have to contribute rather more to those clubs and societies."

hmmmm....

So the Union would rather help students work out and swim individually than join a club to do sport.

Does anyone think their anti-the-involved-minority attitudes have gone too far?

Personally I think offering free gym facilities is a really positive step. It will encourage more students to keep fit and will surely help push the message that a healthy(ish) lifestyle is important - which ties in nicely with looking after students welfare etc..

How many clubs will eb affected anyway: most martial arts clubs can use the Union gym so it must only be badminton, squash and basketball really - and they are getting vastly improved facilities.

I'm assumming the swimming pool use is also included in this, hence you also have clubs like swimming (obviously!), water polo, dive club, canoeing, etc..

Actually I think it's a sham.

The marketing point of providing 'free' sports centre facilities will be heavily promoted by the College to prospective students. In reality only the swimming pool and 'fitness gym' will be free. Everything else will cost cost cost.

What really gets me is that the tiny minority of individual swimmers get a new service completely free (c'mon fitness gym? if people were really serious about fitness they could go for runs in Hyde Park FOR FREE, or go cycling round Hyde park/London FOR FREE or even do exercises in their digs/labs/offices FOR FREE OR EVEN WALK/RUN/CYCLE to work - the fitness crew just want to show off their muscles!), whilst meanwhile the team sports players will all be directly penalised for wanting to get so much more from their sport than just a lower heart beat at rest.

In order to 'even out' the added cost of the new sports centre, the Union Executive decided on Tuesday night to charge all clubs and socs for the use of space in the Union building too, which hitherto was available free of charge!! So the net effect of the new centre is that Clubs that will never use the sports centre have to absorb higher costs because of it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Can you believe it?

Clarification:

The swimming pool will only be free to 'individual' users. NOT CLUBS.

Water polo, canoeing, etc etc will all have to pay extra.

Tom:

I know this doesn't make much difference to whether or not this is a good idea but...

How much extra will the clubs have to pay and will it make it prohibitively expensive compared to other clubs which also charge a considerable amount (e.g. rugby when you include coaches and match The idea of making it fair by charging for the union gym does seem a little perverse though.

"Executive decided on Tuesday night to charge all clubs and socs for the use of space in the Union building too, which hitherto was available free of charge!!"

Now this could be interesting to hear more about, 'they' made me sit through training on wednesday and told me rooms within the union are free...can see some large contingency claims if its any different in reality.

Charging Clubs & Socs for space in ICU

• -------------------------------------

Wow. Now THAT is a huge can of worms. I'd like to say that I am actually in favour of it, in principle, because it allows for fairer allocation of money/resources and allows people to see the true cost/benefits across the board.

However, in my opinion, charging like this would take at least one year of preparation (not just the financial concerns) to implement.

Please, please, please don't let anyone try to implement this within a (calendar) year.

The DPFS was mandated to put the charged allocation of Union space into the budgets for next year, on a 'fair' basis - ie if teh sports centre charges 20p per m^2 per hour, then that's what the Union would charge - the idea being that it would then make no difference to a club if they were allocated the sports centre or the Union gym.

However, if the masterplan replaces the gym with a single storey inferior gym which becomes a steam room after ten minutes exercise then the sports centre gym will be seen as the preferable one, I'd guess.

either way the revenue raised was envisaged to 'subsidise' other clubs usage in the sports centre, so whichever way you look at it there are bound to be compaints from all quarters.

The DPFS also suggested raiding the Exec reserve to subsidise the sports centre users, but I guess that would severely annoy people like the Yacht Club who were told a surplus generating investment using Union reserve money was unfeasible (ie buying a yacht). If that money is then handed to College on a plate (via clubs) then, well I suppose college would be happy!

Are they planning to charge for the meeting rooms as well - because that would just be silly...

Yes, a free sports centre will make a monumental difference to my fitness, because I can't afford to exercise and that's why I'm overweight. Oh no wait, I think I might be confusing laziness with poverty.

In reality it's a very cunning piece of marketing. Offer it free, get people addicted and then whack up the price. Now if only this were crack, the government would probably have something to say about it.

On the subject of space charging:

Very sensible idea, as long as you increase the budgets to account for it. This forces people to think about the resources they are consuming (plus they will pay 20% of this cost from membership income I think - correct me if my knowledge of club finances is outdated).

Some clubs consume a vast amount of space resources, often at the expense of others. I've always hated this, as often one club will block book a room 5 evenings a week for a term and refuse to relinquish it for occasional use by others.

On the subject of charging for Club use:

College space charges everyone according to usage. I think the Union is the only group which was exempt from this. Hopefully the College will be increasing the block grant to take into account this new policy and it will all be happy happy circular money. If they don't then it's a shame but I still think free personal use for everyone outweighs the cost to some clubs - I know Mr Arif is keen on representing what he thinks is the majority view ;o)

And before anyone starts whinging about clubs being shafted, I used to be a member of a club housed in a purpose built facility in the old sports centre. That facility wasn't in the plans for the new one, effectively shafting a 100 member club, but you get over it.

" as long as you increase the budgets to account for it."

Aha! I think you've found the flaw in an otherwise sensible plan. The likelihood of clubs budgets ever going up is approximately the same as the Pope winning the next Epsom Derby.

That's not entirely true. All of the sports clubs were given appropriate funding to make their ground hire costs explicit in their budgets last year. Or at least that's how it should have been...

To reiterate, I think space charging clubs is an excellent idea, but a system to manage this and work the finances of it will take at least a year to plan properly. Let's introduce this in 2006/07.