Last Day to Vote

Kia ora koutou.

Well, today is the last day for voting. The count will take place in Wellington on Wednesday.

I'd like to thank everyone who has voted for me, and especially those who actively supported my campaign by offering me advice and feedback, recommending me to their colleagues and in many other ways.

More broadly, I want to thank everyone with whom I have have been in contact since I declared my intention to stand as AUS President in June. I have had conversations by phone, email, blog comment or face-to-face with literally hundreds of members. And I appreciate the fact that many more members have taken the trouble to drop in on this blog to assess my thoughts and actions on issues of the moment.

This level of contact has been excellent preparation for me to take on the role of President if I am elected. I now have a deeper understanding of the interests and needs of the membership of this union and have also been able to form an effective working relationship with every Branch Committee in the country.

Regardless of the outcome of this election, I remain committed to the AUS and look forward to working with you all in the future.

David Small

My message to members

To watch this video, click the arrow button on the bottom left corner of the frame.

In this clip, I outline my priorities if I am elected President:

• Improve on gains made from the Tripartite Process and protect it from a possible change of government.
• Develop a unified way forward on amalgamation that engages and advances the interests of all AUS members.
• Devise a national strategy to resist redundancies.
• Improve democracy and membership participation in our union.

Campus Visits - Waikato, Auckland and Massey Albany

Last week, I was on the road again. Up at 4am on Tuesday (close enough to daylight saving to still feel like 3am!!) to drop in on Canterbury cleaners on the way to catch an early flight up to Auckland.

University of Waikato
Then I borrowed my brother's car and drove down to Hamilton. I had an excellent session with members at Waikato University; an informal gathering over a couple of hours where a lot of people came and went and some were able to stay right through.

I introduced myself, described some of the initiatives I have taken at Canterbury over the last few years, and outlined my priorities for the position of National President. One of the themes to emerge from the discussion was the need to develop some national strategies for resisting redundancies, which is something I am commmitted to working on.

University of Auckland
On Wednesday morning I re-recorded my YouTube video clip and then headed into the University of Auckland with its expensive new 1 (as in State Highway 1) logo. I had a lunchtime meeting with members there, and then had some drinks together at the end of the day. One of the issues we discussed was the PBRF, as Auckland people have been putting a fair amount of work into developing a position paper on this issue for the AUS Conference in November.

There is currently a chance to reshape the PBRF for the future. But, in the event that we are unsuccessful in doing this, we discussed some ways that we could collectively resist a repeat of worst aspects of the last rounds.

Massey Albany
Thursday was my day at Massey Albany. By now, my prediction of a TIASA 'No' vote in the amalgamation (I had heard what TIASA leaders had been telling their members about the AUS) looked as though it was coming true. We discussed the implications of this for the amalgamation issue and what it means for the many members who are hoping to see the creation of a single tertiary union.

It was also during my time up north that the Returning Officer agreed to issue a statement clarifying that endorsement of my opponent in this election by the National President was not an official endorsement. This was a response to concerns raised by some National Council reps and other members at large, who felt the endorsement was prejudicial.

Campus Visits - Victoria University

On Thursday 27 September, I spent the day holding meetings with members at Vic on their three sites. I had a good briefing and dialogue with Branch President, Steve Blumenfeld, and some of his colleagues on Tuesday before going to Palmerston North for meetings at Massey. And then on Thursday (as Steve was in PN that day) I managed to find my own way to the venues of the three meetings on Vic's different locations; Pipitea, Kelburn and Karori.

I had been told not to expect sell-out crowds (term time and school holidays!) and I didn't. But I did manage to have some very fruitful discussions with a good cross-section of members; library staff, academics, liaison, technicians and student support services. I was pleasantly surprised that one of the members' meetings included a student from my 300 level Maori Education and Society class of 96, and another included a former employee of the Canterbury Students' Association.

Discussions on national policy centred around the results of the amalgamation ballot and the future of the tripartite forum. My views on these matters were well received and will soon be shared more widely by way of YouTube videos. (My introductory video message can be seen at http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=davidtsmall)

For those members I was unable to either see or speak to on the phone while in Wellington, I do hope you will get/keep in touch over coming days.

And thanks to the Branch Committee for contributing towards my travel costs. With Air New Zealand's monopoly on the Christchurch to Wellington route, the fares are outrageous at the moment. Still, at least this time they didn't oversell the flight and try and bump me off again.

Campus Visits - Massey University, Palmerston North

Last week, I travelled to Palmerston North to spend some time with members there discussing the election and other matters of importance to them. I began the day with some informal discussions over coffee and then held two open meetings for any interested members; one at the Hokowhitu campus, and the other at Turitea. Between these meetings, I met with the branch committee, that included a video link with the Branch President based on the Albany campus, Andrew Cardow. I plan to visit the Massey Albany campus later this week. I also held an interview with the student magazine, Chaff.

With the amalgamation ballot only just having been announced, members were interested to know my response to it. I shared my analysis of the vote and what I saw as the risks and opportunities that it presented to the AUS. I also explained the sort of strategic leadership that I consider is necessary at this point. I will make these views more widely known to AUS members with a video message on YouTube later this week. (My introductory video message can be seen at http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=davidtsmall)

I would like to thank all those who took the trouble to come and meet me. And for those who couldn't make it (with children myself, I know the demands of the overlap between school holidays and term time), please do get/keep in touch. david.small@canterbury.ac.nz

At 6pm, I bid farewell to my hosts and boarded the NakedBus bound for the capital and a day of meetings at Vic.

Supporters' Networks

A big thank you to everybody who has expressed their support for me and offered to help to get me elected. I now have supporters' networks on every campus and am planning to get around and meet members around the country over the next couple of weeks.

I am really looking forward to these trips as they will give me a much clearer sense of what local and/or national issues are of most importance to members.

If you are inclined to help, I have a number of suggestions of things you could do that would involve very little effort - and some things that would require more time :-) So please get in touch (david.small@canterbury.ac.nz) and I can put you in contact with my supporters on your campus.

It's rather disappointing to see signs of a dirty tricks campaign emerging (see the Anne Rogers post in the Comments section of Amalgamation: For or Against), but I'm hoping it's a one-off and will not allow it to distract me.

Interpreting the Ballot

We had a very interesting Canterbury Branch Committee meeting last Thursday. One of the issues we discussed was how we would interpret the results of the amalgamation ballot.

We have given members an assurance that Canterbury's voting delegates at Conference will decide how to interpret the ballot and cast their votes only after close consultation with members. Two alternatives approaches were discussed: one that delegates split their vote in proportion to the views of Canterbury members in the ballot; the other that the Canterbury votes be interpreted as either favouring or opposing amalgamation and that all votes at Conference be cast one way or the other. There are probably other ways of deciding as well but the branch's commitment was to consult members at Canterbury about the best approach to take.

We also decided to share our deliberations on this matter with other branch committees and to see if any other committee has come up with a good formula or good arguments that we haven't thought of.

I am also writing to the returning officer to suggest that the ballot be opened in the presence of Wellington-based scrutineers from the pro and anti camps in order to avoid any accusations about the way the ballot was conducted.

Addendum to this post:

I've just been speaking with Auckland and this is their current thinking (although they too are not certain about the best way forward):

• If the yes vote is less than 65%, conference delegates to unanimously vote No;
• If the yes vote is 65% or more, they need to decide betwen unanimously voting No or dividing their vote in proortion to the way it was cast at Auckland.

I hope we can have some more discussion and clarity on these points before the vote is counted and announced. Discussing it in the abstract is probably preferable so we can really focus on getting a formula that most faithfully reflects the will of the members.

Suggestions or comments on these matters are welcomed.