lubs, its exactly the imposition of an empirical system that i have an issue with, the fact that they have had to wait for a senate majority to get this through makes me wonder who it is designed to benefit.

in reference to your first paragraph, a student referendum (not a union or uni board decision) was exactly what i was suggesting.

surely the situation is unique to the individaul uni's, as those with larger student populations will be able to sustain a critical level of membership under VSU.

just a guess, and im probably making some massive generalisations, but i wonder if the young liberals are precisely the ones best equiped to deal with the loss of funding for political activities.

its not easy being wrote: just a guess, and im probably making some massive generalisations, but i wonder if the young liberals are precisely the ones best equiped to deal with the loss of funding for political activities"

Well according to them they are well equipped to deal with this because its the liberal thing to do. There ideological fedelity and logic suggests political activities should not be funded by governments - and especially if they are Lefty political activities. Have they thrown out their own baby with the bath water?
Only time will tell. Will big business fund their activites as they do in countries dominated by dictatorships? As of July 1 this country will be a self elected liberal dictatorship

If we wanted a Socialist government, we would have voted for them, as I see it, 'compulsory' student unionism is pure and simple socialism by stealth.
The very idea that we HAVE to join a union which is always the target of the highly politically motivated, is anathema !
If the Uni is required to provide particular services, then ADD IT TO THE FEES and RUN THEM, don't have a student union which as some kind of wannabe, tryhard, would be if we could be upstart trainee dictatorial socialists.
The whole idea of 'compulsory' student unionism is the very face of socialism which it seems to try to hide. I.e. that they will FORCE you to comply. They will wax eloquent and long about individual and human rights.....until they get their hands on power and then they will bleed you dry in the name of the 'from each according to his ability and to each according to his need' which was never fulfilled to my knowledge except in the 2nd chapter of the book of Acts, and even then the ethnicities crept in to the point where the Apostles had to eventually appoint a committee to run the daily distribution.

Human nature does NOT want to be giving giving giving, without any 'getting', and the CSU mob simply know this, and that they cannot continue 'their' agenda without making it compulsory to all.

A little known fact of history is that since the 1970's university students have had the right to to resign their membership of student unions and this was recognised both in law and by student organisations and their constitutions. The attack by Liberals on unionism is simply that, an attack on organised unionism

Yeah Rainier, but those students who have "contientious objections" to joining unions are still mandated to pay EXACTLY THE SAME amount of money as they would have paid in Union fees into some vague general University fund (it's never been quite clear where that money goes) Wow! what practical choice! only in a dictatorship would that be considered voluntary choice, it makes me think of "elections" held in Stalinist Russia, where the Party was the only candidate on the ballot and elections were "voluntary"...but if you didn't vote the KGB would be likely to pay you a visit and soon you would be shovelling snow in Siberia.

No-one ever seems to mention Garrett Hardin's essay on "The Tragedy of the Dommons" when discussing VSU. I don't know why. Of course very few will bother to pay for the services student unions provide - and many will be sorry when they've gone. For example, at one of the universities I went to, there was a student union dental service. Since there is little public sector dentistry, as we all know, this was a valuable service, but quite costly for the union. Wouldn't be there under VSU. It doesn't take too many root canals to get your union dues back. And why are we all being so mealy-mouthed about the other huge benefit - those lovely low drink prices at the Union bars?