Queer Action Collective passes vote of no confidence in Queer Officer

The Queer Action Collective (QuAC) has passed a vote of no confidence in Queer Officer (QO) Andrea Zephyr at a meeting on Thursday, April 13.

The vote follows a motion moved at QuAC’s previous meeting on Thursday, April 6.

The collective also voted to ban Zephyr from future QuAC events.

QuAC, a collective and organising space for queer students on campus, elects two office bearers around the end of Semester 2 each year; these office bearers double as the Queer Officers of the Students’ Representative Council (SRC).

Each office bearer position is able to be split into a two-person shared role, however; one QO position is held jointly by Zephyr and William Edwards, while the other is held in full by Connor Parissis.

The vote, which passed with 28 votes of no confidence and one abstention, is not a formal removal of Zephyr from her role as QO; in order to remove an officer bearer, a vote must take place at the next meeting of the SRC, which will occur on Wednesday, May 3.

Aiden Magro, who moved the motion to hold a vote of no confidence, submitted a statement supporting the motion; it states that Zephyr would “allow the radical right [into QuAC] in the name of being apolitical”, a community that Magro believes “have openly and continuously undermined the validity, safety and identity of the LGBTQIA+ community”.

Zephyr is also said to have “facilitated meetings without the presence of other QOs frequently” and “failed to upload the minutes of one meeting for a substantial amount of time”, while the minutes themselves were taken “incorrectly”.

While a student at the University of Technology, Sydney (UTS), Zephyr was banned from the UTS Queer Space “with a unanimous vote”, according to Magro’s statement. The statement continues, “Andrea has also been banned from Queer Collaborations and NOWSA”.

Zephyr was also president of the University of Technology Sydney Students’ Association (UTSSA) in 2014, but stepped down in July of the same year.

Following the vote, fellow QOs Parissis and Edwards have called on the SRC “to formally dismiss her”.

Honi has reached out to Zephyr but she had not responded at the time of publication.