By Rowey Worner Butcher
Additional Reporting by Sophie Felice, Angela Paulson, and Jenna Durante
A motion to transform the Environment Department into the Environment Committee has failed at ANUSA’s 2025 OGM.
The motion, which was moved by ANUSA President Will Burfoot with support from the broader ANUSA Executive, required a 75% majority vote to pass.
The final vote, which consisted of online and in-person votes, totalled 173 in favour of the motion (58% of the voting total), and 125 against (42% of the voting total).
Several procedures were moved at the beginning of the OGM to bring the motion to the forefront of the meeting. One of the speakers for the motion, Carter Chryse, stated “It’s what we’re all here for.”
A procedural motion was also passed limiting the total number of speakers for and against the motion to a total of three, restricting the discussion of the motion to approximately 20 minutes.
The motion followed a February announcement by the current ANUSA Executive outlining their intention to “transition the Environment Department to an Environment Collective.”
This move came after an independent report issued by ANUSA revealed the Environment Department spent around $6,000 in 2023-24 sending members, and allegedly some non-ANU students, to various conferences, including the Marxism Conference, Keep Left Conference, and Land Forces Expo.
The proposed changes included providing a $2,000 “minimum budget line” for the proposed collective, as well as “up to three co-conveners to assist the [Environment] Officer” and the presentation of the proposed committee’s policies to the ANUSA SRC.
Those speaking in support of the motion emphasised the alleged risk faced by ANUSA if the Environment Department were to remain as a department as opposed to a committee.
ANUSA’s Welfare Officer, Keira Rosenberg, stated “if we don’t act now, we jeopardize all our SSAF funding.”
Rosenberg further stated, “us as the student union would rather be doing literally anything else with our time, than picking up after the mess SAlt have made.”
A speaker against the motion, Environment Officer Sarah Strange, stated the Environment Department “has nothing to do with SAlt.”
She argued the ANUSA Executive were “providing an endless stream of justifications and actions” to transition the department, but emphasised “I have committed to 100% of the recommendations made in the audit.”
“Cutting the Environment Department was not a recommendation of this audit.”
The motion to transition the Environment Department was the first of many to be voted down at the OGM.
A motion to implement a new disputes and misconduct process, which the ANUSA President called “the most important motion” of the night, failed to pass.
The motion was proposed to make up for the current disputes model which “has several flaws” including “the ability for the panel to form and meet rapidly”, “lack of governance oversight” and its ability to “[engage] students to sit on it.”
Speakers against the motion claimed that the motion “extends the right to discipline not just elected members, but all members, ie. every other student on campus.”
Others stated the motion sets a “poor precedent for freedom of opinion.”
In his right of reply as mover of the motion, Burfoot emphasised the necessity of the motion in the broader governance structure of ANUSA.
“We’re a charity, we’re a registered organisation, we’re a not-for-profit organisation. If we don’t commit to the rule, then we’re able to get in trouble.”
Ultimately, the motion failed to pass.
A “purely legal” motion was passed at the end of the night, which clarified the “powers of the executive to manage.”
At the core of the motion was the separation of the ANUSA Executive and the SRC, outlining that the “Executive’s responsibilities are outlined, clearly and precisely.”
Crucially, this distinguishes the ANUSA Executive as “directors” within the organisation, which is not applicable to the broader SRC, consisting of over 50 members.
One speaker for the motion stated that if it were to pass, the SRC “would not be held legally accountable for any mess up that the exec does.”
The motion passed, with 86% in favour.
The final motion passed for the evening, was titled “ANUSA Opposes Cuts.”
The motion included ANUSA “calling for all ‘Renew ANU’ plans to be dropped,” and endorsing the “Education Committee’s actions in campaigning against the cuts.”
ANUSA’s next general meeting will be held on 16 April, 2025.
Graphics by Shé Chani
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