USI Resignations?

I put a question mark on this since I received it from USI, and I didn't 100% realise that there were resignations until the very end. From the article is appears that both the USI President and the Equality Officer resigned. Any word on whether anyone from Trinity will go for the positions?

I figured some people would find this relevant/interesting.

USI WELCOMES BALLOT TO ELECT PRESIDENT


15 October 2007


The Union of Students in Ireland (USI) has said that this month’s ballot to elect the national president of USI “will be a springboard to the next phase of vital work for the student movement”.

Richard Morrisroe stepped down by mutual consent as USI enters the next phase of campaigning.

The full statement:

“Thanks to the successful lobbying by USI of the current and previous Cabinets, this year has already seen the Union increase pressure on the Government to fulfil the pledges USI extracted from Fianna Fail and its present coalition partners during the general election campaign. The Government is utterly bound and entirely pledged to keep Free Fees sacrosanct, establish a Student Accommodation Taskforce to end the housing crisis, and reform the Student Grants system.

"Winning these Government pledges, and steadily raising the level of priority that Ministers attach to them, has seen the Irish student movement go from strength to strength this year.

“While USI officer board regrets the resignations tendered during the weekend it accepts that these actions were necessary for the long term growth and development of the organisation. Students’ Unions across Ireland convey thanks to the officers stepping down for representing third-level students during this vital year.

“The ballot will be a springboard to the next phase of vital work for the Irish student movement.”

Ends


Notes to editors:

Steven Conlon also steps down as equality officer; a separate election will be held.

Current members of USI officer board did not write a letter appearing on a political blog site.

In relation to the final line about the political blog, anyone know what that's about?

Crash

found this : http://www.indymedia.ie/article/84653

I feel soiled, i was on indymedia - *shudder*

Crash

and this : http://www.politics.ie/viewtopic.php?p=866147#866147

Stargal

Myth wrote: »

In relation to the final line about the political blog, anyone know what that's about?

The whole entertaining mess happened over at politics.ie. Last Monday someone anonymously posted what appeared to be an internal USI Officerboard memo which called on USI Pres Richie Morrisroe to resign cos of all the mistakes that he'd apparently made.

The mole then panicked and removed the memo, deleted their comments and re-named the thread early the next day. However it was re-posted by David Cochrane, the guy who runs politics.ie - see the middle of this thread. Among other things it accuses Morrisroe of bringing USI into disrepute by "telling the national media that 'lots of students drive their own cars because public transport is too expensive', which led directly to media ridicule." It's funny.

Anyway there was a vote of no confidence taken in Morrisroe on Saturday morning, following which he resigned. Equality Officer also resigned - despite what it says at the end of the press release, the p.ie folk are saying that he was the person who wrote the letter but not the one who posted it anonymously.

Discussion on the weirdness of someone posting it anonymously here on politics.ie as well as a discussion of the resignations here. And when I say discussion I mean a debate on just how crap USI is.

/yawns.

Meh. Idiots.

Tricity Bendix

stargal wrote:

And when I say discussion I mean a debate on just how crap USI is.

/yawns.

Meh. Idiots.

+1

Thanks for the direct links Stargal & Crash, I haven't had time to flick through p.ie in a good while.