Trinity College Students’ Union will be voting to remove a number of full-time officer positions from the Union of Students in Ireland (USI) officer board. The SU Council voted on February 23 to mandate the delegation going to the yearly USI Congress to vote in favour of various motions to remove a number of full-time and replace them with part-time officers. 

The full-time position of equality officer and lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender (LGBT) rights officer will be removed and replaced with part-time positions and the three full time area officers will be consolidated into a single full-time position called the constituent organisation (CO) liaison officer.

Trinity SU will be proposing the motion at the USI’s annual congress to replace the equality officer with a part-time officer. All the twenty-two delegates from Trinity SU are mandated by the SU Council to vote in favour of this motion. 

The Trinity SU Council motion says that ‘despite the best of intentions, and a strong work ethic from the officers involved, the USI Equality Campaign has not had a significant impact upon the lives of students on campuses on a day to day basis.’

The USI’s constitution says that the equality officer has ‘responsibility for the implementation and development of all Union policy in relation to issues of discrimination caused by age, disability, family status, gender, marital status, membership of the Traveller Community, nationality, race, religion, sexual orientation, and/or socio economic circumstance.’

Speaking to The University Times Linda Kelly, the current equality officer said ‘while we fully understand and support TCDSU’s democratic right to submit motions to USI Annual Congress, the Equality Campaign will be asking delegates to vote against the motion which calls for the downgrade of the Equality Officer position to part time. 

We believe that the campaign is only viable with a full time officer.’

The position of LGBT rights officer is 

also subject to a motion to amend the USI’s constitution to make the position part-time. The motion is proposed jointly by Trinity SU and Dublin Institute of Technology (DIT) SU. 

Again Trinity SU delegates are mandated to vote in favour of the motion at the USI’s congress. Trinity’s mandate says ‘while much work still needs to be done on the LGBT campaign, when consideration is given to the amount of work being done by groups such as GLEN, BeLonG To and MarriagEquality, the amount of policy material within the USI LGBT rights officer role is not sufficient to justify it being a full-time position.’

The LGBT rights officer is ‘responsible for carrying out the Union’s policy on lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender rights, encouraging the participation of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender students in the Union and working to eliminate prejudice against the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community’ according to the USI’s constitution.

The University Times contacted Laura Finlay, the LGBT rights officer to comment on the motion but she did not reply. 

There is also a motion going to the Congress that will consolidate the three full-time positions of area officers into a single constituent organisation (CO) liaison officer. Trinity are also mandated to vote in favour of this motion.

The USI’s congress is also when the officers for the following year are elected. This year the candidates for president are Linda Kelly, the current equality officer and Gary Redmond UCD SU’s president.

The race for deputy president is between Jono Clifford, the USI’s Southern area officer and Trinity SU’s president Cónán Ó Broin.