University of Queensland Union

The UQU operates most of the campus's student eateries, cafes, bookshops in addition to the university bar and cinema. These facilities and services are concentrated at the Union Complex at the St Lucia campus.

The UQU organises the university's orientation week ("O-Week") activities, regular barbecues and free bands, as well as a range of larger events, such as Oktoberfest and, as of 2009, the annual Toga Party. Recently the UQU introduced a club funding scheme that supports over 200 clubs and societies, including faculty, ethnic, and a variety of social groups; sporting groups, however, fall under the domain of UQ Sport. The UQU also provides a free legal service to university students. In addition, it also organises the weekly Wednesday markets at the St Lucia campus.

One of the other roles of the UQU is to see that minority groups on campus are adequately supported. To this extent, it provides a Queer Space at St Lucia campus and Women's Spaces at St Lucia campus and Gatton campuses. The Ipswich Campus Queer Room has since been closed down, as a result of frequent vandalism by the occupants. UQU also has queer, women's, environment, disabilities and Indigenous collectives to represent their respective interests.

UQU coordinates student representation to the University through its Student Representation, supporting students to take positions on faculty and University committees, and the Academic Board. UQU recently successfully negotiated for the University to contribute 1 million dollars to the Union annually for student services. UQU also negotiated for the "formula marking" scheme (under which markers can deduct marks in multiple choice exams if a marker believes the student guessed answers) to be abolished .

The UQU oversees over 220 student run Clubs and Societies,[1] with a combined membership across these clubs of approximately 36,000 students. Clubs fall under one of four broad categories based on where they derive their membership base. These categories include: Faculty/School; International Students; Colleges; and General Interest.

Clubs play a vital role on campus, with the majority of social events at UQ being run by these student groups.

Semper Floreat (Latin: "May it always flourish") is the student newspaper of the University of Queensland. It has been published continuously by the University of Queensland Union (UQU) since 1932, when it began as a fortnightly newsletter of only a few pages, produced by one editor. It was previously published as Queensland University Magazine and Galmahra.[2] The Student Union also published a Songbook for Commemoration celebrations, featuring songs celebrating the Faculties and Professors of the time. The Songbook went by a number of names, including Whack-Ho.[3] By the 1960s songs were omitted from the publication, replaced by articles and cartoons reflecting student culture of the time.

The chief editor in 2019 is Rowan Evans.

The University of Queensland Union Complex has a long history as a haven for democratic rights struggles. The Forum Area is a place for ideas and political discourse. The University of Queensland administration is trying to take down the one space it does not control on the St Lucia campus, the University of Queensland Union Complex. This is corporate theft from generations of students and staff. Students built the UQ Union Complex with their union fees and gave it a history that forms part of Queensland Heritage.

The UQ Students Union Forum -Chronology of Resistance

1965 Women chain themselves to the bar of treasury and regatta hotel to protest against sex discrimination

1966 Vietnam Action Committee formed -new -left style -University based -Civil Liberties and Vietnam oriented

Footpath protest in month of March against Vietnam War -31 arrested.

Student demonstration Action -Vietnam, Education, University, Civil Liberties.

Conference on S-E Asia at University organised by off- Campus peace groups

Public Forums at centenary Park on Saturday at organised well attended

March from University to City by students on 5 October.

27 out of 40 students arrested armed police provocation and violence.

November – A.L.P. loses Conscription and Vietnam Election.

Protestors attacked by police during President Johnson's visit to Brisbane.

S.D.A. begins leafleting, door-knocking, opens Printery (to become Action printery), violent clashes during President of South Vietnam Ky's (US puppet) visit for refusing to pay fines resulting in October conscription Protest

1967 Four people jailed for refusing to pay fines resulting from October conscription protest.

May – Civil Liberties Coordinating Committee formed to fight restrictive sections of the Traffic Act.

June -C.L.C.C. gave government ultimatum of deadline 11 July for sections of the Traffic Act to be repealed.

July – Deadline extended to 5 September, mainly due to negotiations the Student Union President and State Government

July – Anti-Radical "scare^ll articles run by monopoly media

4 Sep – Premier Nicklin promised decision on ultimatum

7 September –Rally and March postponed to 8 September

September 7 – Nicklin Government offer unsatisfactory

8 September 1967 – 4,000 people march to the city. Two thousand sit down in Roma Street. 114 arrested with police violence (shown).

Trade Unions, ALP, Qld Council for Civil Liberties lodge protests in reaction to police brutality.

Union for Civil Liberties Demonstration in King George Brisbane. The demonstration was called by the Trades and Labour Council of Queensland to protest against police treatment of university students and staff in Roma Street, Brisbane during a protest march. The march, from the University of Queensland to the city, had been held a few days earlier.

The street march campaign (1977 – 1979)

On 4 September 1977 Joh Bjelke-Petersen, the Premier of Queensland, said the following words:

"The day of the political street march is over. Anybody who holds a street march, spontaneous or otherwise, will know that they are acting illegally. Don’t bother to apply for a permit you won’t get one. That's Government policy now."

On 22 September 1977 there was a march from the University of Qld Student Union. This followed an earlier march on 12 September 1977 that was stopped at the gates of the University by 300 Queensland police officers. This did not stop students from walking on the footpath to a rally of 5,000 workers on Trade Union Rights. Wharfies marched to the rally in Roma Street forum.

The 22 September march went off campus and regathered in King George Square to attempt a march into the valley of death.

The first man arrested in Qld for demonstrating against the street march ban in 1977 was PB, a cleaner, identified by initials only who was arrested at 5.15pm on 22 Sept 1977 for disobeying a lawful direction. He was arrested by Constable Gary Hannigan, then from Sandgate CIB and to be the youngest ever detective in the Qld Special Branch. Hannigan's dad was an Inspector of police.

IR (a student at QIT) was arrested at 5.49pm, then LB (unemployed) at 5.55pm, LM (a graduate from Darling Downs Institute of Advanced Education) at 6.00pm, PA who was the Australian Union of Students representative at University of Queensland was arrested at 6.58, NN (a Student at Griffith University) at 7.03pm. The last person arrested in King George Square that night was JM ( a UQ student) who was arrested at 7.07pm.

All these people except for PB had been attending meetings at the University of Queensland of the newly formed group to fight the ban. It had been named the Civil Liberties Co-ordinating Committee or ‘CLCC’. By that last arrest, 20 people had been arrested on the King George Square steps. Another 12 were arrested later at parliament house.

The women arrested were stripped searched in the watchhouse that night in the presence of male police. Maris, a young student and member of the CLCC, organised a defence for all the arrested people in the courts and a few were acquitted. This was the beginning of 3,000 arrests of 2,000 people (some were arrested on several occasions) and court appearances which would continue unabated for 2 years – every time there was a political street march.

The democratic rights struggle is the longest single campaign of mass defiance of government in Australian history.  The longest struggle is aboriginal resistance to colonisation. From 4 September 1977 till July 1979 2,000 people were arrested, there were 3,000 arrests with the largest of 418 people being arrested in a single afternoon of 22 October 1977.

I have been asked to read out the following short passage written by Anna McCormack who was the women's rights organiser at the University of Qld Student Union in 1977 & 1978.  Anna could not be here today ... her views are supported by women who were active in that struggle which, I think, was part of the democratic rights struggle here in Queensland.

"I’d like to acknowledge a group that played a positive role in progressive student politics at the Union in the 70s and later.

The group was the Women’s Rights Committee and their room was the Women’s Rights Room. There is the room (point it out) in which they met and planned women’s rights campaigns in the 70s, ironically now a Commonwealth Bank.

Interestingly, this Student Union, the University of Qld Union, was the very first student union in the country to appoint a part time paid Women’s Rights Organiser.  That was significant.  It was in 1977 and it was in recognition that women needed to be able to campaign against the disadvantages and discrimination women students experienced at that time – and still experience.  Anna who was appointed to that position in 1977 is still politically active in the Women’s Liberation Movement more than 40 years later.

The Women’s Rights Room was often a hive of activity as women planned amongst other things, a campaign to get the Student Union to adopt policy supporting women’s abortion rights.  A student referendum was held on the issue and unfortunately the women were unsuccessful at that time.  A policy of ‘no policy’ was upheld.  It would be another 40 years before those women were able to celebrate Qld abortion decriminalisation.

A campaign about women's safety on campus raised awareness of the prevalence of sexual assault and rape on campus – it was some years, however, before the university responded.  The Women's Rights Committee also campaigned against sexual harassment of students by some academic and teaching staff.  They campaigned successfully for the withdrawal of student union funding for a student club that printed a newsletter that incited violence against women and girls.  They successfully called for the reinstatement by the Student Union of a woman cleaner who had been sacked for no reason.  These were a few of the areas around which these women's liberationists campaigned, sometimes with success, often without.

When the Women's Rights Room became too small for their meetings, the women asked the Union for a larger room.  The request was refused so the women and a couple of supporters, (myself and JM), occupied the room and moved the furniture."[5]

In recent years, the UQU ended its accreditation with the National Union of Students, making it the only student association in the Group of Eight universities to have done so.

1991–1992, the Union was run under the umbrella of the Liberal (or Young Liberal) party.

1994–2007, the Union was almost exclusively under the control of parties aligned with the Labor party, usually the left leaning wing. Liberal students regained full control for a single year in 1996 and won a majority of the split executive in 2003.

2008–2013, the Union was run by a party under the banner "Fresh" (Liberal National Party of Qld).

2014–2017, the Union was run by Reform (a coalition of Labor's left and right factions), during which significant opposition came from Lift (independents) and Thrive (LNP).[6]

On 14 September 2017, after intense divisions between Labor's Left and Right factions, the Reform ticket announced their disbanding.[7] The Labor Right faction formed a separate, independent coalition supported by a faction of Young Liberals, as well as some Greens and Independent students, to contest the elections under a new ticket named Focus. The Labor Left faction attempted to continue as 'Reform', however, they failed to lodge their nominations correctly. Owing to some administrative errors, Reform's Union Council ticket did not appear above the line.

After the errors made during the nomination process, the Reform ticket announced on Facebook that they intended to withdraw from the contesting the 2017 Student Union Elections. In the same post, they endorsed the Socialist Alternative ticket 'Student Action'.[8] The 'Reform' ticket remained on the ballot papers for the Union Executive and the Union Newspaper, but the ticket did not run a ground campaign during the elections. The newly formed 'Focus' ticket was elected in a landslide.[9]

In 2018, the Labor Left faction re-formed as 'Momentum'.[10]

A referendum was planned to be held simultaneously with the 2018 election, but was announced in a manner inconsistent with the regulations. The referendum was thus postponed, and held instead during the last week of exams, and a regulatory amendment made to allow voting online. However, of the 6383 votes counted, 2218 were "against" votes were submitted from a single non-University IP address, significantly contributing to none of the referendum questions passing.[11][12] One of the questions of the referendum related to eligibility to hold positions for elected officers. Several students who had been elected were not eligible to hold office under the current constitution, but would have been had the question passed. As such, these students vacated their positions immediately upon assuming office at the conclusion of the Annual General Meeting. These vacancies lasted until the first meeting of the newly elected council.[13]

In 2019, Labor Right split from the Focus deal, and attempted to create a new ticket with Labor Left. Near the close of nominations, the newly re-formed Labor group were advised that another electoral group had reserved their intended name, 'Together'. The Liberal faction within Focus successfully nominated under the name 'Real'. The Returning Officer extended the nominations deadline to allow the Labor group to resubmit their forms with a new name (they chose 'Empower'), but the campaign manager for the new 'Together' ticket appealed the decision to extend the nominations deadline, taking this appeal to the Electoral Tribunal. Labor were supported in defending against this appeal by their former Focus allies in 'Real', but the Electoral Tribunal found against both the major parties, and in favour of 'Together', finding that the regulations did not grant the Returning Officer the power to extend the nomination window. Empower campaigners began the election on a platform of Real having sabotaged the election, but soon changed tactics to a more clear-cut Below the Line campaign.

Following voting week, the REAL executive ticket was elected in a landslide by a margin of 63% - 37%. This marked the first time in 6 years that no member of the Australian Labor Party held an elected position on the University of Queensland Union Executive.

2019

In 2019, the UQ Union Council is made up of 23 student representatives elected from five electoral groups, spanning from five different student factions, plus an independent.[14]

Union Council Composition Following the 2018 Elections

Party	Faction	Seats	Total seats
Focus	Young Liberal National Party	7	11
	Labor Right	4
Momentum	National Labor Students	8
Student Action	Socialist Alternative	2
Smokers' Rights	Young Nationals	1
Team Rocket	Anti-national left (Independent)	1
Total		23

2020

In 2019, the UQ Union Council is made up of 23 student representatives elected from seven unique electoral groups.

Union Council Composition Following the 2019 Elections

Party	Faction	Seats
REAL	Young Liberal National Party/Independent Coalition	9
Smoker's Rights/Revive/Activate/Together/Unite	Young Nationals	2
Student Action	Socialist Alternative	5
Empower (appeared on the ballot below the line)	National Labor Students	1
	Labor Right	2
Forward/Progress	Anti-national left (Independent)	1
International Student Assembly		5
A Better Experience		1
Total		26

The UQU has produced a number of notable alumni including Governors-General of Australia, CEOs, Chief Justices of Australia and State Premiers.

• Sir Thomas Groom, UQU President 1928, Lord Mayor of Brisbane
• Sir Harry Gibbs GCMG, AC, KBE, QC, UQU President 1936, Chief Justice of the High Court
• Sir Walter Campbell AC QC, UQU President 1942, Governor, Supreme Court Judge, Chancellor of the University of Queensland
• Barry Murphy, UQU President 1963, CEO of Caltex
• Anna Bligh, UQU Women's Officer 1981, Premier of Queensland
• Paul Lucas (politician), UQU Treasurer 1983, Deputy Premier and Attorney General of Queensland.
• Robert Wensley, UQU President, Deputy Chancellor of the University of Queensland.
• Fleur Kingham, UQU President 1983, UQU Secretary 1982, Queensland District Court Judge.
• Jillann Farmer, UQU President 1986, Medical Director of the United Nations
• Murray Watt, UQU President 1994, QLD Labor Senator
• Julie-Ann Campbell, UQU President 2007, QLD Labor Party State Secretary

• University of Queensland Debating Society
• Union College
• University of Queensland Intercollege Council
• UQU Schonell Theatre
• National Association of Australian University Colleges

• UQ Union