The referendum question - no good time for Swansea Union

“Do you want the Assembly to have the power now to pass laws on all the subjects which are devolved to Wales?

1. YES

2. NO”

This is the question that First Minister Carwyn Jones sent new Secretary of State for Wales (and Chesham and Amersham) Cheryl Gillan for her approval.
If she agrees with the question we can then move on to setting a date for the referendum.




There is plenty of debate currently occurring about whether the question is right and what date the referendum should be held on amongst politicians, experts and the twitterati.

Thankfully there is no debate about what stance the students’ union will be taking on the forthcoming referendum – the students’ union, pending a motion to SGM, will throw its full weight behind the ‘yes campaign’.

In the 1997 vote on whether there should be a Welsh Assembly Swansea voted yes, just about. 53% said yes and 47% no, with the margins this fine, the student body could decide whether Swansea votes yes or no this time.

So when could our students’ union make the most positive impact on the yes campaign?

October 2010

A referendum in October this year seems to be the First Ministers choice, but how much time would people find to campaign for a yes vote in the mayhem of fresher’s fortnight and its aftermath?



There will be many Ents shaped distractions for students and our staff will be just about recovering from the stress of whatever joys the busiest two weeks in the calendar has served them up.

Maybe we could combine welcome speeches with rip roaring political addresses asking our new intake and their grannies that have come to help them move their stuff in, to vote yes.

March 2011

Well how about the romantic patriotic option of a March 1st referendum? Although, that has been tried before in 1979 when the people of Wales voted no, and not for the first time in our history conspired to end our own existence.

The referendum would either be held on Wales national day, March 1st, or because elections are always on Thursdays, March 3rd is another possible date, which is close enough to St David’s day for the yes campaign to ride on the wave of patriotism.



But assuming that the students’ union sticks to our 2010 timetable, a March 3rd referendum would be on the day that the sabbatical elections are launched.

With a large bulk of union activists of all political colours time being taken up preparing their own sabbatical campaign or helping friends, either way a lot of potential yes activists could be a little pre occupied.

May 5th, 2011

The last and least likely option is to hold the referendum on the same day as the Welsh general election on May 5th.

It isn’t hard to imagine that students involved in political parties would put the referendum on the back burner in order to campaign for their party.

With all four party’s supposed to be campaigning together for a yes vote this could be disastrous to our efforts in a national and union context.

Added to this that May is exam season and you have a recipe for total apathy for the referendum.

So all in all…

There seems no good time to hold a referendum if your Swansea University Students’ Union.

The fact that all of the dates hold serious perils for our efforts in the yes campaign means that we will have to put time and effort into preparing our contribution to the yes campaign in Swansea and the country.

But on a positive note our union was number one in Wales for promoting the ‘Vote for Students’ campaign in the Westminster elections, in now small part down to Luke Young’s energy for the campaign.

And with similar preparation I am sure we can beat all these set backs and provide just as positive a boost to the yes campaign, whenever we’re needed.