2020 Committee Lunch

By admin, 30 March, 2022
Date of Meeting

    2020 Committee Lunch

    Date: 14th February 2020 (2020-02-14)

    Attendance


    Present: Cerian Richmondjones (President), Emily Passmore (Secretary), Leyla Manthorperizatepe (Dr. WHO), Madeleine Ross (Foody), Tryfonia Mitsopoulou (Charities and RAG Officer), Shreya Kirpalani (Entz Officer), Michael Beattie (Environment & Ethics Officer), Amelia Wood (Housing Officer), Emily Reed (Women's Officer)

    Absent with apologies: Conor Callaghan (Treasurer), Geheris Gidlow (Lindsay), Keren Kassanda (Access and Admissions Officer), Megan Snaith (Environment & Ethics Officer), Hannah Raja (Ethnic Minorities Officer), Hamzah Mahmood (Ethnic Minorities Officer), Lauren Shirreff (LGBTQ Officer)

    Absent without explanation: Rory Dangelo (Vice-President (Administrative)), Leoni Loughlin (Dr. WHO), Szymon Musial (Foody), Molly Green (Sports Rep), Alexander Baxter (Sports Rep), Rocco Huesch (Academic Affairs and Careers Officer), Andi Marsh (Access and Admissions Officer), Dhruv Sengupta (Affiliations Officer), Nathalie Spiller (Charities and RAG Officer), Leah Fahy (Entz Officer), Anna Brainin (International Students Officer), Mhairi Cadenazzi (International Students Officer), Naa Ntodi (Housing Officer), Samuel Myers (LGBTQ Officer), Thomas Falezan (Website & Computing Officer), Melisande Prince-Hodges (Women's Officer)

    Agenda


    Note: the time of the meeting was changed to noon on Friday, people were told this on Tuesday. That ****may**** explain why so few people turned up. 

    Also note: because so few people turned up, I only remembered to start minuting properly when we started talking about money - enjoy my best reconstruction of everything that came before that (fortunately I have a lot of opinions about it so I was actually listening). 

    Agenda 

    • Use of JCR space 
    • Committee lunch attendance 
    • Welfare week budget

    Minutes


    Use of JCR space 

    Earlier in the week, some student ambassadors for amazon set up a stand in the JCR, giving away free stuff to promote amazon prime etc. They also posted about this on the Facebook page. There’s been some questions about whether any of this is allowed. 

    The main issue people have is with the use of the JCR’s physical space - there’s free speech on the Facebook page. 

    Amazon is a commercial business, paying students to advertise in a communal space - this seems questionable. Things that are promoted in the jcr tend to be non-commercial, or linked to a specific committee post (academic affairs, entz) so benefit students, or directly associated to a student e.g. start-ups. Do we want companies to be able to pay for this sort of advertising? Especially in cases like amazon, where there is a massive moral and ethical objection to their business practises. 

    There are currently no rules mandating the use of the jcr, but: 

    a.) the St John’s divestment occupation group used it to organise - but they were actively trying to disrupt e.g. they booked out rooms under fake names 

    b.) the Union is banned from the freshers fair because it’s a private business

    c.) there are other rules about what can be given out by societies at the freshers fair 

    Theoretically, we could pass a motion at a GM instating rules about using the space - for example, give notice and it has to be approved at committee/exec/a gm. But not all cases are clear cut, where would be draw the line? It could be linked to a committee position, and then that officer would have final say. 

    This could be seen as the committee trying to take control, and ban people from having free stuff. Also, it could have unwanted side effects - the St John’s divestment movement used the space, so do Common Ground, this would affect them too. 

    Still, there are like nine of us here - the discussion is postponed to a meeting with a higher attendance. Which brings us on to…

    Committee lunch attendance 

    It’s a bit dire. We don’t want to move back to Wednesday, but Friday doesn’t seem to work either. People say they don’t attend because they have lectures - we could hold it on a weekend, perhaps before a gm, this works at other colleges. Also people might attend gms more, so we’d have a slightly bigger chance of actually being quorate. 

    Welfare week budget 

    Leyla and Leoni have put together a timetable of events for welfare week. 

    Free ones include donuts in the ocr on Tuesday (funded from peer supporter budget), dance workshop on Thursday, and an anxiety workshop in week 6. 

    The ones that need funding are:

    • Monday - arts and crafts night -> £40 for wine and materials 
    • Wednesday - snacks (fondue and chocolate fountain) and face masks (questionable logistics, but if people want to have a go, they’re responsible for their own decisions) with women’s officers -> £50
    • Thursday - movie/kahoot with ethnic minorities officers -> £25 for snacks 
    • Fonie and Nathalie are also doing cookie grams all week -> £20 towards ingredients? Fonie thinks this could come from charities budget instead - also pro tip from Maddy, freeze cookie dough, it’ll taste like fresh when you bake it :) 
    • Barty on Friday with karaoke - Shreya says we have a mic, stand and sound system, this could be diy 
    • Also a wellness mocktail for the bar -> £10 for ingredients 
    • Late night pantry baking (can’t really use in day) on Saturday -> £20 for ingredients - Maddy will email dean to confirm (we saw her right after, she’s fine as long as Maddy’s in charge)
    • Also normal welfare tea 

    The max budget is £200 - Leyla asks for £150, this should cover the events planned with a little to spare. 

    The budget passes. 



    Also in good news, pantry made £13 profit last week :)