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► General Meetings More Information
How General Meetings work
Frequency
1. The union should hold general meetings (GMs) at least monthly during term-time(four times a year).
2. Students may also call emergency GMs by collecting the names, signatures and student ID numbers of 1% of the union membership (approx 200 students). These will be held in addition to the regular GMs. Emergency GMs should be for one purpose only. If that purpose is to overturn a previous GM decision then students must collect as many signatures and student ID numbers as there were students who voted for the original motion, plus one.
Powers
3. The executive committee (‘exec’) agrees to delegate its policy-making powers to the GM. The GM will therefore be empowered to vote on union policy and debate and make political decisions. However, exec may vote to overrule a decision by a two-thirds majority with all exec members casting a vote, if necessary in a separate meeting. This decision must be actively publicised including an announcement at the next GM.
4. The GM will have no specific power over the budgets of the union, and may not vote to remove union officers. In the event that passed policies include statements that the union cannot act on for legal or financial reasons, then exec and the union trustee board should try to act on the spirit of the motion to the best of their ability.
Quorum
5. The GM will have a quorum requirement of 30.
Motions
6. Normal motions should be submitted by 5pm one week before the GM. Motions may be submitted by email but proposers and seconders must include their student ID numbers. They may be any length (a few short sentences or longer lists of statements), but points should be numbered.
7. For a motion to be debated it must be submitted by two people: a proposer and a seconder. However, two is not a limit: as many seconders may sign up as want to (before the deadline). Proposers and seconders may offer a description of themselves up to seven words long (eg. ‘Islamic society president’, ‘Postgrad journalism student’).
8. After the deadline, motions received should be publicised by the union. Paper copies should also be provided at the GM itself.
9. ‘Emergency motions’ may be submitted at the GM if there is spare time – such motions will be read out by the chair and then debated as usual. If there is more than one emergency motion to be heard then a priority vote should be held (see ‘priority vote’ below).
Campaigning
10. Students may campaign to build support for their motions among the student body (eg. produce leaflets, send online messages) in the period between the motions deadline and the GM.
Chair
11. The chair should be a sabbatical officer or member of exec if they are available and willing (this should be decided by exec in advance). If this is not the case, then an open election for chair will be held at the GM. All candidates for chair may make a speech for up to one minute on why they are suitable for the position. The votes for chair will then be counted by a suitable person chosen before the meeting by exec.
12. There should also be a deputy chair, in case the chair wishes to speak or faces a no-confidence vote (see ‘No confidence’, below). The deputy chair should be selected by the same procedure as above.
13. It is the chair’s responsibility to count the votes for and against motions. If there are a large number of students present then the chair may appoint ‘tellers’ (vote-counters) to help them count. The chair should also record the results of votes taken by the GM, but may delegate this role to a minute-taker if required.
14. If any student disputes a count, they may propose a recount, a vote of no confidence in the chair (to be followed by a recount), or refer the dispute to the executive (see ‘Disputes’ below).
Executive committee report
15. Each GM should begin with a report from exec. Exec should decide the form of this in advance (eg. speech by the union president, Q&A, written report, or a combination). This section of the meeting must not take up more than one quarter of its total running time; after the exec report the meeting will move on to motions.
16. After the report, the GM may propose censure (a formal motion of disapproval) of the actions of any member of exec; this recommendation will then be passed on to union council. The GM may also attempt to mandate any member of exec to take a particular action (eg. write a letter, start a campaign); again they will be accountable to union council for this.
Priority vote
17. At the start of the motions section of the GM, students will be asked to vote on which motions they believe should be debated first. Students may vote for as many motions as they like; the one that receives the most votes should be debated first, the second-highest number debated second, and so on.
Speeches
18. Debates must be balanced, but motion proposers must also have the right to reply to the debate. Therefore debate will take place in ‘rounds’ of speeches (one for, one against), followed by a summation. The first speech for and summation will both be ‘owned’ by the proposer.
19. ‘Owning’ a speech means that you may either take it yourself, waive it to any student in the room (with their consent), or decline it (in which case it becomes a ‘free speech’).
20. All other speeches are ‘free speeches’ and will be allocated by the chair to students with their hands raised. The chair will decide how many rounds of speeches to allow for a motion, or at their discretion propose a vote on whether further speeches should be allowed. Only union members (students) may speak at the GM. Other speakers must be approved by a majority vote.
Voting
21. Each union member (student) has one vote per motion. Non-students cannot vote. Students may vote for, against or abstain; however abstentions do not count for or against majorities (eg. a two-thirds majority means two-thirds of the voters who did not abstain). In the event of a tied vote the motion falls.
Changes
22. Any student may propose changes to a motion: adding text to the motion or deleting a particular section. Changes must be submitted to the chair while the motion is being debated but before the proposer’s summation. The chair will hold these changes until the summation, and also make a further call for any changes before the summation.
23. Before the summation, each change will be debated and voted on in turn either until there are no further changes or the GM ends the debate by passing procedural motion b (see ‘Procedural motions’, below). After all changes have been voted on, the debate moves back to the main motion (as amended by any changes) for the summation and vote.
Procedural motions
24. Any student may raise one of the following procedural motions at any time by submitting it to the chair or deputy chair.
a) No confidence in the chair (see ‘No confidence’, below).
b) The motion should be voted on now (ie. no further speeches allowed).
c) The motion should not be voted on at this meeting (ie. the GM takes no action on the current motion and moves on to the next one).
25. All procedural motions can pass with a simple majority.
No confidence
26. Any student in the GM may propose no confidence in the chair at any time, by giving a short reason to be read out by the deputy chair. Votes on motions of no conference should be counted by the deputy chair, who may also appoint tellers (see ‘Chair’ above). If this vote is carried by a majority then a new chair must be elected.
Guillotine
27. The end time of the GM will be decided beforehand and included in publicity material. When this time is reached a ‘guillotine’ falls, which means any debates in progress must be balanced and then move to summation and vote. The meeting will then end.
28. However, the GM may vote by a two-thirds majority to extend the guillotine if it wishes – any student wishing to propose this must do so when the chair says the guillotine has fallen.
Policy lapse
29. Policy made by a GM will be in force for one year.
30. The union officers will keep a record of all policy passed at GMs and refer to it in their day-to-day decision-making.
Disputes
31. These rules can never cover every possible situation. Any disputes over interpretation of the rules should be brought to exec in the first instance, who will make a decision on the matter. Exec are then accountable to union council for their decision.
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