Following the cancellation of last month’s council, we were back to business as usual for September’s SRC council. This month’s meeting opened with a series of tedious procedurals and tit-for-tat quarrels that have come to define student politics at this irreproachable sandstone institution.
President and Vice-President reports were used as pretence by responders for a larger interfactional argument about the failures and successes of the USyd Gaza Solidarity Encampment. Simon Upitis (SAlt) and Maddie Clark (SAlt) criticised Grassroots for meeting with representatives from the University of Sydney’s management, while Harrison Brennan (Grassroots) and Rand Khatib (Grassroots) argued that the left should have a presence at these negotiations.
This argument carried on through the night: seemingly the only point of agreement reached between Grassroots and Socialist Alternative was their shared loathing of Labor Left.
Somewhere amid this chaos, Queer Officer Jamie Bridge resigned and re-nominated with Wendy Thompson to be elected as Queer Officers. As reports finished, we moved to the first motion of the council — out of an impressive 14, dashing our hopes of an early night — , calling on the SRC to “support the union-led campaign to scrap junior pay rates.”
NLS spearheaded this motion, with Gerard Buttigieg (NLS) noting that “the prevalence of junior rates in this country is abysmal”. Upitis and Ishbel Dunsmore (Grassroots) both spoke against the motion’s support of the SDA union, labelling it as right wing. Despite this, the motion was carried with full support from all councillors.
The following motion sought to assert the SRC’s support for community legal centres, particularly in response to the June Federal Budget, which provided no relief to centres during a widespread funding crisis. Queer Officer Wendy Thompson spoke to the motion, stating that “they’re already having to turn away thousands of people.” The motion carried successfully.
The third motion, “Save the Arts at Macquarie”, was spoken to by many students across many Sydney-based Universities, condemning the “corporate tactics” of Macquarie University management and was passed with no dissent.
Q4 reflected on the Annual Report on Sexual Misconduct and outlined the Women’s Collective’s demands for a campus free of sexual violence. Eliza Crossley (Grassroots) spoke to the motion, stating that “The university is still incompetent…it is still failing victim-survivors”. Crossley also outlined the motions policy to change the title of the Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment officer roles to Sexual Violence Officers, in order to more accurately reflect “the seriousness and ongoing effect of sexual violence.”
The fifth motion called on the SRC to stand in support of victims and survivors of gendered and domestic violence. Rand Khatib (Grassroots) and Crossley both spoke to the motion, describing a recent vigil for a USyd student who was a victim of intimate partner violence. Ellie Robertson (Grassroots) also spoke to the motion, stating that “The University has failed to even mention this is an instance of femicide or domestic violence…this campus is a place that is hostile to women”. Q5 was passed unanimously.
We then moved swiftly to general business, starting with a motion to oppose the Australian Labor Party’s actions against the Construction, Forestry and Maritime Employees Union (CFMEU). Julius Wittforth (SAlt) and Clark both spoke in support of the motion, with Clark noting that the “union movement in Australia…has been the one factor that living standards haven’t completely crashed.” Victor Zhang (Engineers) also spoke in support, stating that the CFMEU is “an example of what an effective union looks like”. NLS conceded that Labor were in the wrong, with Angus Fisher’s (NLS) opening statement — “Labor is not on the side of workers this time” — causing an uproar in the room (you just had to be there).
Following a procedural to reopen the speaking list, a lengthy line of speakers to the motion, and a request from our very tired minutes-taker and Returning Officer Riki Scanlan for someone to fetch their Thai delivery (Honi apologies for missing the email), the motion carried and we were let out from our windowless New Law cocoon for 15 minutes of fresh air.
It was then that NLS decided to not only dip out of the building, but also the meeting, resulting in a good 20 minutes of anxious waiting to see if we would hit quorum to continue the meeting. Thanks to a few councillors zooming in, we resumed the meeting with a procedural from Honi to move our motion to back pay our recently onboarded editor. SAlt voted against the procedural, citing that there were “more important political matters” to argue over and that Honi was “drivel”. Nothing we haven’t heard before! Thankfully, the procedural and motion were both passed in a matter of minutes with no arguing, despite SAlt’s dissent and abstention, #yay.
The following motion called for the abolition of prisons and an end to the racist system of carceral violence, with Dunsmore and Brennan speaking to the disproportionate rates of incarceration of, and police brutality against, First Nations youth. Khatib echoed these sentiments, noting that “not one recommendation of the Royal Commission [into Deaths in Custody] has been implemented” and pointing out the failure of the Labor government “to bring forward a real solution to what Indigenous people face in this country”. Wittforth amended the motion to add an action that USyd cut ties with Parklea Correctional Centre and other prisons, noting that FASS3999 has a case study which asks students to make recommendations to improve comfort in prisons.
We then moved to motion R3, which called for the SRC to condemn the ongoing genocide in Gaza and Israel’s escalation of attacks on Jenin, the West Bank and south Lebanon. The motion also called on the University to divest from weapons companies and companies complicit in the genocide in line with Boycotts, Divestment & Sanctions (BDS). Khatib introduced and spoke to the motion, noting the upcoming National Week of Action in October, organised by the National Union of Students and BDS Youth.
A line of SAlt speakers and hecklers followed Khatib, with Shovan Bhattarai (SAlt) demanding a debate be had regarding mobilisation strategy. After a long debate between Grassroots and SAlt over Encampment organising, negotiations with Management and prescriptions of activism, the motion was passed unanimously. Despite the lengthy arguments between SAlt and Grassroots, some common ground was reached regarding the value of the upcoming National Week of Action and the overall successes of the USyd Encampment.
A procedural was passed shortly after to move R4: ‘Solidarity with the Refugee Encampments’ and R8: ‘We Stand with Mano & Tamil refugees’ en bloc. Annabel Pettit (SAlt) spoke to R4, recounting her experiences at the Punchbowl protest outside Tony Burke’s office. Pettit noted that Burke spoke with protestors and discounted their efforts and experiences, asking them to “have patience”. She spoke against Burke’s response to the protestors, stating that he “could alter the lives of these refugees” with a “flick of pen” but instead “he told them to shut the fuck up”. Dunsmore and Ravkaran Grewal (Grassroots) then spoke to R8, with Grewal reading the ACAR statement on the death of Mano Yogalingam, the Tamil asylum seeker who died in Naarm after self-immolation.
With morale dropping as the clock ticked toward 11pm, a procedural was moved for all remaining motions to be voted for en bloc with two speakers. The speakers, Bridge and Yasmine Johnson (SAlt), spoke briefly to R5: ‘The Sad State of the Response to the Disabilities Royal Commission and the NDIS Bill’ and R9: ‘Solidarity with international students, scrap the international student cap’ respectively.
All remaining motions were passed en bloc and the last council before elections wrapped up at a surprisingly early 10:53pm, and Honi headed home to catch up on some much needed z’s. See you next month!
For more details on this meeting, check out Honi Soit on X or Instagram.
