On Monday 8th February 2010, 192 students crowded into OG46 for the Union’ Annual General Meeting, all with one thing in mind – saving the SU by passing the new Governing Documents.

You may have seen the posters, possibly joined the facebook groups or even read the documents on CCSU.co.uk, but you still may not be entirely sure exactly what was going on, so let me elaborate.

About 18 months ago, the Charity Commission announced that all SU’s whose income was over a certain bracket (and ours is) would have to register as a charity with them within a certain timescale. As a result, the Union had to completely redo all of its governing documents that outline how the Union is run – a process that took a full 18 months to complete. None of it would have been meaningful though without the stamp of approval from at least 100 students of Christ Church, and this is what the AGM was for.

Simply put, not enough students at the meeting meant not enough people to vote for or against the documents, so no document to give to the Charities Commission in the summer of 2010, so we couldn’t change to a charity, and therefore wouldn’t be legal!

The Union holds an AGM every year, but this one was truly special as the students of Christ Church proved that they wanted to safeguard their Union for the future.

The students scrutinised the Union’s accounts from 2008-9, passed motions to lobby the University to increase the networking capacity and the Wi-Fi coverage around campus, as well as have more student-run night in the Student Building bar and remove the £35 charge for charities to attend events.

They also heard reports about what the Officers had been up to and made sure that they were doing what they had promised to do last March.

Thank you Christ Church, you proved that students are not apolitical and apathetic and can rally around when it matters the most.

Full details of the AGM can be found in the minutes of the meeting on www.ccsu.co.uk

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