The petition
General Secretary of UCL Union, Sam Godwin has been suspended from duty. No justification has been given for this action and the nature of the charges against Sam have not been made clear as is stipulated in the standing orders for disciplinary procedures.
Sam has been under attack recently for her chairing of the Annual General Meeting of the students union (March 5th) at which motions to twin with Palestinian universities and to end military recruitment at freshers fayre were passed. These democratically passed motions have resulted in a backlash from students who oppose them and the tabloid press, but rather than attempting to overturn them through the democratic channels of the union, members of the executive of UCL Union are underhandedly attempting to get the whole meeting annuled by first suspending Sam and then passing an illegal motion to governance committee instructed it to overturn the resolutions of the general meeting.
Inaccurate reports of that meeting have been circulated which ignore key facts - such as the fact that illegal attempts to call quoracy while leaving the room were made.
The fact that despite all the attacks on Sam no reason was given for suspending her shows that no misconduct can be found in Sam's chairing of the meeting where she was faced with heckling, numerous attempts at disruption and a vote of no-confidence which was not upheld by the floor.
It is therefore obvious that this suspension is politically motivated. It is part of a wider attempt to get the entire proceedings of the agm overturned (including all the motions voted on democratically by ucl students) orchestrated by a faction of students who disagree with the way the votes went.
It is vital that UCL students stand up for our elected General Secretary against this shameful, unsubstantiated, and politically motivated attack and defend the democratic process at our union. We must resist any sinister attempts by the union exec to undermine decisions made at the AGM, the most democratic body of the union at which students can directly participate in influencing union policy. We the undersigned find this action against Sam disgraceful and demand that she be reinstated.
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