This is fantastic news! Well done National and please, please take it past Select Committee and make compulsory membership of student associations a relic of the past.

Please also ensure that compulsory funding of them, like I have to put up with at Auckland University, is also ended.

Compulsory membership is not a fair title in the first place, you actually can opt-out, My Association did grant opt-outs and it is the Government who made the law so that the Student Assns can’t give a refund back to Students, and instead they are forced as per the Education Act (section 229A (5) & (6) found at: http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1989/0080/latest/DLM175959.html) in that they (the Student Assn) have to give the membership levy to a charity.

Why blame the Student Assns for that? They didn't write the law.

There are many reasons for VSM; you get management in a Student Association who will always try to take control of the Student Associations. It makes me sick! I have been the president of one where I had to get rid of 2 Managers. I also put some good clauses in our constitution and policies to make sure that there remained an element of institutional knowledge so that any new President would have the right guidance from the manuals put together, and a safe guard to prevent fraud, if you know an Assn that does not have this then do something about it, come up with solutions instead of doing nothing but campaigning for the dissolution of the strong hold of Student voices.

Compulsory gives you something for a levy, who will pay $100 out of their own pockets? Currently it is made easier where your Student loan can cover it. Hardly anyone will be able to afford to pay $100 out of their own pockets, CSM means Student Assns have to submit an audited account to the incorporated societies and the same with rules of the Assn.

Everyone likes free stuff, why pay for something when you don't have to? Even if you can visit a doctor for free, or use advocacy, a support person, a cheap shop, people t go to for advice, hardships, foodbank, and in Palmerston North there are two Student Associations who pay a fee to the busses so students can use it for free as much as the like when ever they like. According to my calculations, if you use the us which is $2 for students per trip, if you use it twice a day for 5 days that comes to $20 per week, and if your course runs over 40 weeks @$20 = $800, you probably would use it to go t the library, to go to the doctors, to go study on a Saturday so that would be additional trips… you get the point by now I‘m sure. There’s also the free food that gets put on, and the Orientations at the start of the year and mid year orientation which costs thousands to put on fun things for students. Students Assn’s are important for retention, having contact with people and having a safe guard there for when things get tough is important too, you never know how lucky you are until you come o need the help of a Student Assn.

If you are a student you should get active, join the exec and put recommendations forward, read the constitution, call an SGM, get rules amended, make your Assn transparent and accountable. It is cheaper to get all the services from Student Assns than an institute, there's going to be so many funding cuts it will become user pays or no services at all. Today NZers are privileged; we get things handed to us and are ungrateful for what we have until we lose it. A vote for VSM is a loss no matter how you look at it.

“Freedom of Association” means that you are free to associate with whom ever you please, it has nothing to do with Student Associations, being a member of anything does not prevent you from having a freedom of Association with your friends, get educated people! If you thought it had anything to do with an actual Assn body then clearly the bill title is misleading and who ever decided to call it that should go and get a real tertiary education.

VSM, in my opinion is a form of censorship.

You will not have much of a say if you had to go and fight on your own but place a Student body of representation and there you have back up. VSM undermines Student’s power to have a voice. If you chose VSM then you are choosing to have no voice.

Just because there can be low voter turn out it does not mean it was not put out enough, it does not mean people don't know about it, you cant prove that. When I was a Student I never voted at all, I couldn't be bothered, I didn't really care about anything other than my course, what I was going to have for lunch and who I was going to see each day. Put a survey together and get a balanced view.

Student’s Assns do muck up sometimes, sure, I agree it sux, and they need something in place to make sure they can’t flop sideways, but the same should be done about government, look at all the gross mis-spending there!!

At least with a Student Assn if you make noise among members you get heard. You go to Govt and you will soon find yourself escorted out by security or you will never get an email response. City councils are even worse. Michael Laws is a classic example of not listening to his people. Act get on their high horse because they are the pillars of society, look at Donna who was done for fraud.

Politicians are a joke. But we still need them to help create what we are comfortable calling order. I think the whole thing is a waste of time even debating at Govt level. National better be mindful that they could end up very unpopular with Students.

Maybe the Maori seats should not have been taken off the poly councils, and supercity seat?? Geze, what’s this country coming to? Tiriti o Waitangi anyone?!! Partnerships, this government is going from muck up to muck up, there is no clear vision, its just changes left right and centre and unlike with Students Associations, we pay a fee (tax etc...) and we don’t get a say, not unless we get thousands of people together!

In finishing, Australia recently went VSM, it was bad. Very bad. Don’t believe me, ask the New Zealand Union of Students’ Associations (NZUSA) if they can source a copy of a report done based on information from many Uni’s in Australia to see what I mean (www.nzusa.org.nz).

As far as finding out what your Association does for you, get your own info about what your Association does for you instead of expecting people to hand it to you. Stop being lazy and complaining when you don't get all the information. Save the environment, or better yet tell Anne Tolley to stop making budget cuts to the tertiary sector and not to get rid of fee maxima so you won’t have to pay $30,000 for a course. $440 million is going to be cut, $98 million was cut from scholarships, and TIA cut, so if you are unfortunate and have to rely on a benefit then you are not being aided to get a degree and a job. You probably will have kids, you should start saving now, if you’re 17 and have a child when you are 25 and are saving about $10 p/wk then you might be able to afford a Diploma (2yr course) and two years of rent plus food for your child when they turn 17 $130,000 doesn’t buy much these days. Hope that you only have one child! This is real.

It amazes me that with all the crap things that National is doing that people are focusing on getting rid of the representation that won Students interest free loans, and almost won a universal Student allowance (you wouldn't have to pay it back but National have put it on the back burner, probably so it can be forgotten), The very same representation that will be at the forefront of fighting for your rights to a free education.