THE fallout from the recent DIT referendum, which abolished the position of women's rights officer in the DIT, has continued into 1997 - the third year that there has been conflict over the issue.
Colman Byrne, president of the DIT students' union, informed USI in December that the union would be withholding its affiliation fees, from the national union. The reason behind this radical move is believed to be Byrne's continuing unhappiness with the involvement of Fiona McAuley, USI's women's rights officer, in the debate which preceded the DIT referendum that month.
McAuley had made comments in E&L defending the position of women's rights officer and opining that the workload involved in the position of part time equality officer, into which the women's rights position was subsumed, would be too much for one individual to bear.
Byrne's response was to ban McAuley from all DIT campuses on the day of the election, although McAuley entered a number of DIT colleges in contravention of the ban and at the invitation of the individual DIT officers concerned.
Thus it was that Byrne informed USI that the DIT was suspending the payment of its annual affiliation fee largely over the events of December. The decision threw up a number of difficulties.
First, according to USI's constitution, which applies to the DIT as a member institution, McAuley is mandated to express USI's position in the event of a constituent college attempting to introduce a contrary position. This put Byrne in breach of USI's constitution by imposing the ban on her.
Second, the decision to withhold affiliation fees is a serious one and under the DIT's own constitution, appears to require a vote by the student council. This did not take, place.
Third, to add to potential breaches of two constitutions, Byrne could add the possibility that DITSU had endangered its own position in USI coming up to the USI annual congress in March. In the event of non payment DIT officers would not have been entitled to vote on crucial issues at congress and no DIT officer would have been able to run for a position in USI.
Since Byrne is likely to run for the presidency of USI this year, supporting the non payment of affiliation, fees was a little like the proverbial turkey voting for Christmas.
Byrne quickly realised that he had put his foot in it and made strenuous efforts to withdraw from the dispute with dignity, although E&L understands that eventually he just withdrew.
USI president Colm Keaveney has refused to comment on the dispute, as has, for once, Fiona McAuley. When contacted, Byrne said: a) what affiliation fees? b) why would DIT withhold affiliation fees? and c) that the affiliation fees were now on their way to USI.
