JCR Committee Meeting 3 HT26 — 02.02.2026
In attendance: President, Secretary, Treasurer, Lord Lindsay, Entz, Welfare, Foodie,
Women*
, Charities, E&E, Housing, Disabilities, Comrade Shakespeare.
Non-committee members: Towa
I. Music Maestro co-option
Towa: There’s a JCR music society fund, would be nice to provide a grant for JCR bands,
individual music pursuits, etc. to build on the Floreat grant.
I’m experienced in the organisational side of things.
Toby: The role has not been filled in a while.
Reuben: To my knowledge, no fund exists.
Toby: Optional levies include a music fund.
Reuben: £20 was donated to it last term.
Unanimous vote in favour of Towa. Towa has been co-opted as Music Maestro.
II. Mural
Eve: Would be nice to continue Elsa’s idea of getting a mural in the JCR. Never
happened because no one suggested a person to do it, but I have found one. Any
thoughts on if it’s a good idea/what we would want as a mural?
Toby: I’m not against, would have to put to a GM.
Eve: We will put it to a GM if we can come up with a plan.
Eli: We’d have to open up to other people to see if anyone else would want to do it.
Will: Might expand one of the bar murals to keep up-to-date, would probably be good
to have a woman on the wall. Want to try to keep the same style.
III. Garden party future spending/June Jamboree
Reuben: Motion passed yesterday to fund garden party £3500. College is NOT happy.
They want all money to come from tickets only. They can’t stop us from subsidising it,
but they don’t want us to.
It’s not sustainable to make huge donations which don’t benefit the whole JCR.
People without tickets are kicked out for the day. Run by JCR students but it’s really
college event. Doesn’t benefit members as a whole.JCR Committee Meeting 3 HT26 — 02.02.2026
Toby: it’s okay for this year, but not in future. If ticket prices can’t cover costs, then costs
need to be cut or ticket prices need to be put up. It is an event which should fund itself.
Although note that the motion yesterday was unanimous.
Towa: In 2024, tickets were £40. June Jamboree fund has increased a lot since then.
Toby: June Jamboree is good.
Michael: What is it?
Toby: A party outside with free food, etc.
Reuben: June jamboree is a JCR event more than garden party, since it is free for
everyone.
Toby: The JCR should support free fun which is accessible to everyone. I would
prioritise June Jamboree.
Eli: Prices of tickets if garden party not funded?
Reuben: Tickets would go up by ~£7.
Eli: At GM last year, people were in favour of reallocating June Jamboree funds to the
JCR.
Elizabeth: Garden party is more accessible than a ball. But it’s still good to have the free
event, we just need to make it more of a big deal so more people go and enjoy it.
Arthur: I don’t think the fact that the event isn’t for everyone is a point against it. We
always give away money to things which only a few people are involved with.
Toby: We could fund the bar to be at June Jamboree this year.
Reuben: Some costs need to be cut, doesn’t matter where from.
Michael: How is this any less good for the whole JCR? Reducing prices makes it easier
for everyone to get a ticket.
Toby: Ball and garden party should be funded by tickets.
Will: How much money does the JCR have?
Reuben: £56,800 a year from college; the rest of our money comes from the bar. The
JCR makes a loss which is funded by the bar. We have £137k in reserves.
Will: Where does the money go?
2JCR Committee Meeting 3 HT26 — 02.02.2026
Reuben: £8500 to committee. £9600 to GMs. Some costs to pantry, insurance. £1200 to
accountant. Refurbishment, gas, electric.
Toby: Create an optional levy of £5 towards garden party/ball to subsidise ticket prices?
Adam: Garden party is trying to be too big.
Avrah: We’re losing sight of the fact that anyone who is buying a garden party ticket for
£70 will buy one for £77.
Eli: No, the extra £7 would make a difference to my decision.
Eve: Okay but surely not fair for someone with £7 less than you who can’t afford a
garden party ticket at the lower price?
Towa: £7500 fixed as June Jamboree funding. Maybe turn this into a general events
fund, which VP Org is in charge of allocating.
Toby: Interesting idea, but difficult to decide who gets to allocate. Potential conflict of
interest.
Reuben: JCR has a regular deficit of £3k, which is covered by the bar generally.
Amalia: So June Jamboree is a free event, much less popular, and costs £7500?
Naomi: Doesn’t sound like people weren’t going because it wasn’t fun? Sounds more like
a timing issues — people going home/exams.
Malachy: Should we get garden party committee to report to JCR committee?
Toby: We could ask Maddy to come to the next meeting.
Secretary note — possible future actions: schedule June Jamboree for 5th or 6th week,
change June Jamboree budget to a general fund or reallocate the excess funds, have June
Jamboree in college. Also have the bar there, ice cream truck, bumper cars?
IV. Pool cues
Reuben: Pool table in Masters Field common room in a state of disrepair. Only one pool
cue and it sucks. So can we buy some pool cues?
Avrah: How much will it cost?
Reuben: £32–44 for a set of 4.
3JCR Committee Meeting 3 HT26 — 02.02.2026
Will: Could get nice ones from charity shops?
Reuben: Sure, just want to set aside some money for it?
Vote in favour of allocating funds for pool cues.
V. Charity law/the JCR is not a charity
Toby: I need to register us as a charity, I’m in talks with Jennifer Smith.
Reuben: We’ve lost the progress which Amerleen made. So need to start from scratch.
We thought we were a charity. But we’re not.
Toby: Up to a certain point, you don’t need to do the registration process. But our
turnover is over £100k a year, so now we need to.
Reuben: Does the bar pay VAT?
Adam: The bar collects VAT from sales, and doesn't pay it when buying stock.
Toby: Jennifer says we still need to follow charity law.
Reuben: Constitution needs to be reworked, e.g. need a conflict of interest clause. We
will need to pass the constitution through a GM.
Eli: Any rules against bringing something to GM which has already failed?
Reuben: No.
VI. BOP staff/licensing problems
Reuben: Entz can’t hire people, must be the bar because they need to do training.
Will: Training is casual, just telling staff about licensing rules, etc.
Adam: I don’t think the license demands it. I think Amanda Tilley just wants it.
Jennifer knows about premises licenses but not club licenses so much.
Will: can’t we just train the Entz reps to train the BOP staff?
Reuben: Hiring staff needs to all go through bar accounts.
Adam: It is all by the books.
Reuben: Bring it up with Amanda.
Adam: Any member of the JCR counts as part of the club, so that’s okay.
Toby: Probably coming from Jennifer to ensure BOPs are safe. Just get Will to train staff.
4JCR Committee Meeting 3 HT26 — 02.02.2026
Will: I can go through key licensing objectives with staff.
Reuben: College might stop allowing BOPs if we don’t do what they say.
Eve: Let’s come back to this when we know what’s actually going on and what college
wants.
VII. Blues grants
Reuben: Blues grant is for anyone on the Blues teams to support them for sport-related
costs. But a sixfold increase in applications compared to usual — 20 applications this
term. Maybe because people are becoming more aware of it, and because Elsa allowed
it for people who are applying for the Blues team as well as those on it.
Looking to increase the grant, and change the form it takes. Should it only apply
to blues/half blues/discretionary blues/people who are trialling? Need captain’s
approval? How do we make it accessible for all sports?
Amalia: How much is it?
Reuben: £400 a term set aside. £100 per person.
When Rachel was the Dean, she had a fund especially for rowing, this was
absorbed into the Floreat grant. So JCR set this up to supplement.
Elizabeth: People would need to fill in a form to say what it’s for, etc. Costs fluctuate
depending on the sport. And some sports have major 2s and 3s teams, as well as Blues.
Reuben: Probably impractical to expand to 2s and 3s teams.
Currently for people who have been awarded a full blue.
Toby: I would expand to half blues as well — not fair to decide which sports are worthy.
Naomi: And womens/mens teams are sometimes different categories.
Will: Just because you’re on the 1st team, you don’t necessarily get a blue. Seems unfair
that you don’t get as much because you’re deemed less good.
Floreat is enough for a lot of stuff. Should award grant to people on 1st teams.
Toby: Maybe just for blues is good because incentivises people to play to the best of
their ability.
Reuben: Difficulty in differentiating the needs of different sports.
Gabriella: Can’t we just get people to submit their expenses?
Reuben: I have been doing that. Any relevant expenses are useful info.
Will: For rugby, you have to pay a membership, and you get the kit after that.
5JCR Committee Meeting 3 HT26 — 02.02.2026
Reuben: Just please get people to email me about their costs, and opinions of what
should warrant funding.
VIII. Rents and charges
Reuben: What are people’s concerns about housing right now? (Prices, not allocation
process.) Price inflation currently goes by the Van Noorden Index. This hasn’t been
decided for next year. Amanda says prices will go up by 3.2% or less (in line with CPI).
College needs to make a certain amount. But we can move around rent prices as
long as it all adds up.
Avrah: We can only change this for the next year.
Housing ballots have already begun, using assumptions about existing prices. So
can’t immediately change.
Am I invited to rents and charges?
Toby: No.
Avrah: Sources have told me that in the past the JCR would negotiate, and couldn’t
negotiate rent prices down but negotiated other things e.g. lower printing prices.
Recently we’ve just let things happen as college asks. But let’s ask for other things.
Reuben: There was a rent strike in 2003.
Toby: Rents have increased far more than inflation since then.
Reuben: Other requests e.g. vas res was introduced this way.
Toby: Maximum projected cost of accomodation on Oxford Uni website is exceeded by
the cost of masters field. We should redistribute some of the price of Masters to
Mainsite.
Beth: As first years, we would suffer if main site prices go up relatively between this year
and next.
Toby: I think we could do it this year at the rents and charges committee.
Avrah: We can’t do that, from an administrative perspective.
Toby: one point of negotiation will be to not increase the price of the prepayment plans
in hall.
Eli: £40 subsidy for hall seems unfair on people living further from hall.
Eve: It’s a tradeoff between cheaper prices in hall and people only paying for
themselves. But we shouldn’t pay a different subsidy based on where we live.
6JCR Committee Meeting 3 HT26 — 02.02.2026
IX. AOB
Toby: Is it okay that the next BOP is the same day as a parents formal?
Michael: Yes, Greg Butler confirmed it is okay.
Adam: Everyone needs to make accounts on the JCR website.
Meeting adjourned.
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