Brookes Union plan to scrap student officers including LGBTQ+ and BAME officer

That includes women’s officer, LGBTQ+, ethnic minorities, environmental and more


Brookes Union’s representational student positions such as women’s officer, ethnic minorities student officer, environmental officer are all on the chopping board, as a plan has been made to axe the roles before next September. This move would result in an almost totally white student government for 2020/21.

All the way back in the spring semester of 2020, while most of us were more concerned about the global pandemic that seemed to be making a beeline for our university, its begun to become clear why it took them so long to make a decision that most of us had assumed was an easy one.

Recently, a previous member of the elected representatives for Brookes student union came forward with information that shows that instead of taking the immediate action to close the university and begin putting in procedures to deal with the pandemic, the Union were more concerned with trying to get rid of student officers.

One of the student officers from the 2019/20 academic year came forward to say that the council very suddenly came up with the idea to dissolve itself, which was then almost immediately approved and executed by the Board of Trustees.

“It was all done very sneakily,” they claim, “they scheduled a union meeting for a time when they knew a lot of the officers would be in lectures, and then used over complicated legal jargon when explaining their motion so that most of us couldn’t even understand what they were saying, let alone know what we were voting for.”

The decision leaves only the Union Sabbatical officers – Union President and the Union Vice-Presidents (welfare, societies development, and academic) all of which are paid positions and currently filled almost exclusively by white people.

While the story managed to stay out of student gossip for the entire second semester and over summer, mainly because none of the officers seemed to speak up about it, the decision is still being debated within the Union.

When asked for a comment, the council told The Brookes Tab: “The council session before last voted to undertake a review of part time student officers. This policy was voted upon in a public session and was delivered to and voted on at the Annual general meeting in 2020.

“The last student council voted to review the change and a review is currently being undertaken to see what the best way to represent students is; if that is to hold additional elections then the union will be ready to do so.”