Student politics in University of Ulster will never be the same after this year with the arrival on campus of the mainstream Northern political parties.
Up until now there had never been any party representation on campus. "In fact when our constitution was re-drafted in 1995 it contained the provision that parties not be allowed to form on campus," explains UU students' union president Geraldine Dolan.
In the North's highly charged political atmosphere, keeping political parties out was seen as one way of protecting a non-sectarian and undivided university.
Queens University has allowed political parties for many years and on some occasions tempers have frayed. Dolan thinks there was a fear that parties in UU would "run riot and couldn't be handled", and that this would detract from real student issues.
These fears seem to have evaporated though as last year a general council of the university's students decided by a three-quarters majority to repeal the rule barring political parties from campus. Although they are not eligible for funding, they will be allowed to hold meetings. "There has been a change in the political climate towards debate and we are now able to give people the chance to debate things within guidelines," says Dolan, who points out that as a safeguard for good behaviour the clubs have to be have three successful "readings" - where they are approved by other clubs and societies - before they are considered permanent.
Martin Riley, youth co-ordinator for the SDLP, says they will be running a "student friendly" campaign - concentrating on student issues - on all campuses during the freshers' weeks in order to try and attract as many as possible. "Students find sectarian issues a turn off," he says, believing they want to concentrate on issues more relevant to themselves.
The SDLP grouping will be run together over all the university campuses in the North, Riley says. Gary McAlister is assistant secretary of the Ulster Young Unionist Council, the junior wing of the UUP. He says that they will be providing administrative support and "general donkey work" for those students at Jordanstown and Coleraine who have already expressed an interest in starting up branches of the UYUC there. "It is very much a bottom-up thing," he says.
McAlister doesn't feel qualified to say what issues the branches might concentrate on as it is "early days yet".
The branches in Jordanstown and Coleraine will also be in a different position in Ulster unionist politics. They will be answerable to and send delegates to the UYUC, which in turn sends delegates to the Ulster Unionist Council, the governing body of the UUP. The Queen's Unionist Association on the other hand sends delegates directly to the UUC. The Alliance Party said they would be turning up to the fairs, but they were not certain what the demand would be.
Surprisingly, neither the DUP nor Sinn Fein seem to be setting up at UU. When contacted, Ronald McConnell, chairman of the DUP's Young Democrats, was unaware that any restrictions had been lifted and said the party had no plans to set up.
A Sinn Fein spokesman said the party also had no plans.
Will the influx of "real" politics mean that student politics are hijacked? Dolan doesn't think so. She says that many union candidates in the Republic have the backing of political parties but insists: "So much of student politics is about personalities and student issues, I can't see that being obliterated."
