A footnote of OUSU’s budget seen this week by Cherwell reveals that their financial problems in 2008-9 were substantially worse than previously imagined.
Last Trinity term, the OUSU Budget forecast the income from Oxford Student Services Limited, a subsidiary company of OUSU, at £80,000. In fact, just £4,717 was raised by OSSL in 2008-9. It is forecast that £28,680 will have been made by OSSL this year.
OSSL is the part of OUSU responsible for the publication of the Oxford Handbook, The Oxford Student newspaper, the Fresher’s Guide, and running the Fresher’s Fair.
The enormous overestimation was caused by a provision of bad debts of £12,000, six times higher than had been accounted for, and under-performance in advertising revenue.
The OUSU Budget itself notes that this figure “was a vast overestimate of what OSSL could make.”
The Budget produced by the previous OUSU team forecast a profit of £110 for this year. This was despite the fact that they had made a loss of over £57,000 last year. The current OUSU team forecast a loss of £61,000 for this academic year.
OUSU President Stefan Baskerville said, “We have been very open and honest about the failures of the old financial model and we have taken effective and successful steps to make changes and put OUSU on a stable footing to serve students in the future.”
The perceived financial stability and competence in the running of OUSU are the main reasons why Oriel Colllege voted this week to re-affiliate, for the first time since 2001.
Mark Jesnick, Oriel JCR President said, “I think this OUSU regime has taken huge strides. The biggest thing they have done is change the financial structure and made it more stable and sustainable. This year OUSU has an excellent team and I feel it is in very competent hands.”
Oriel’s referendum result had 72% of students in favour in re-affiliation, with 123 votes for and 48 against.
Baskerville said, “We are very happy that Oriel students have decided overwhelmingly to have their common room affiliate to OUSU.”
