THE FIRST emergency general meeting of the students union at University College Dublin in nearly 25 years was held last night in an attempt to overturn a decision by the union executive to close a student printing facility and make two full-time staff redundant.
The Print Bureau, which is losing in excess of €30,000 a year, was closed after Christmas by the executive, which said it was attempting to deal with a deficit of more than €1.3 million.
However, students opposed to the move claimed there were other areas where cuts could be made which would not cost people jobs. At a sometimes heated debate, student union welfare officer Rachel Breslin said it would be short-sighted to continue a service that was losing so much money.
She said if it were not closed, the loss would “further damage our already crippled union”.
Speaking against the closure Bobby Aherne questioned how the student representative group had built up a deficit of more than €1.3 million and called it “an absolute disgrace”. He accepted that the service was losing money but claimed there were other facilities which could be cut ahead of education.
Elizabeth Coote (72), a mature student who had worked for the union for more than 30 years, pleaded with the president, Pat de Brún, to approach the college authorities and appeal for extra funding to save the jobs.
Mr de Brún said he had “exhausted every option”, that the redundancies were a consequence “of the mistakes of the past” and insisted that if losses continued then the union would not be in a position to get funding in the future.
After the debate a vote took place among the 200 or so students present with a majority voting to overturn the decision. However, a quorum of 5 per cent of college students was needed for the vote to be legally binding.
