Re: [Fsfe-uk] AFFS conference, AGM, reform

[Alex Hudson]

On Thu, 2005-01-13 at 20:17 +0000, MJ Ray wrote:
> Yes, there's a problem. Yes, it's "a gaping hole in the democratic safety"
> or whatever you want to call it. At the moment, I believe ctte could
> do almost whatever they want, apart from a narrow situation at the AGM.
> We've seen it try before.

Ah, we've reached the heart of the matter then. I don't believe AFFS
ctte should be able to do whatever they want, and I don't believe
standing orders fixes that (since ctte set the standing orders, it's
simply exercising restraint). For me, whatever rules that apply to an
election at an AGM should roughly apply generally: if nominations close
10 days before AGM, they should close 10 days before any election.
Committee should not be able to tamper with the basic principles any
more they can with the aims.

> I disagree that the current constitution forces that to be the only
> election. All it forces is an election to happen at AGM and it has
> a "last resort" method which should not be tampered with.

AGM elections were never intended as a "last resort" as far as I was
concerned, and certainly we tampered muchly with them. We played around
with different quorum figures before enacting the constitution, we
changed the voting method. The constitution is not written in stone;
only hard material. I believe the only way we can get people to trust us
as an organisation is to have specific rules in place which guarantee
good conduct.

However, arguments aside: are you for or against an amendment which
would clearly add the possibility of non-AGM elections (this is
orthogonal to the issue of standing orders and rules of election)? And
if you would be favourable to clearing up the issue, why should we set a
different standard for non-AGM elections?

Cheers,

Alex.