by David Bean on Mon Feb 12, 2007 11:31 pm
Unfortunately I wasn't able to make it to the Fair, so I suppose I might as well reiterate my comments to Jonathan.
I think that the idea of creating an internal secretary, whose remit would include sourcing speakers, is a dangerous one. For one thing the identity of any potential speakers is intrinsically linked with the motions, which are naturally chosen by the Convenor and often with certain speakers in mind. Therefore, either the internal secretary would have full control over the remit and potentially be able to derail a debate (by accident or design) by inviting the wrong speakers, or they would simply have to right to people suggested by the Convenor, in which case I can't see a sane person wanting to take the job.
Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, as things stand at the moment the Convener is essentially the 'promoter' of debates events, and it's their head on the line if a debate has to be canceled for any reason, or if, ultimately, there aren't a minimum of four speakers at the table when the debate started. If responsibility for booking speakers were given over to someone aside from the Convenor, I can think of at least two problems:
- It would be impossible to determine accountability for any debate that failed due to lack of speakers
- The Convenor would nevertheless ultimately be responsible for a direct failure of another person.
Now, I know that you could make some version of this argument for any other position on the BoT, but having spent a year as Convenor myself, and experienced debates where guests pulled out only hours in advance, the last thing I'd have wanted would have been to have to get in touch with my internal secretary - or, worse, wait for them to get in touch with me, if they were acting as the point of contact with the speaker - before getting replacements, and nor would I have wanted to trust this exceedingly delicate task to anyone else when it was my neck on the line. Imagine if the internal secretary was the main point of contact with speakers, and when someone pulled out, either didn't bother to arrange a replacement, or didn't hear about it, or went and got replacements behind the Convenor's back, or failed to inform the rest of the Board of Ten?
Moreover, the right to select who speaks in debates, whether from the table or from the chair, and the responsibility to do so fairly and in the best interests of the Society's membership, is one of the most important privileges and duties that the position of Convenor carries, and that's one of the reasons why the position is considered important enough to be elected on a cross-campus basis as part of the general election, and carry an officership on the SSC.
It seems to me that if the Convenor's job is going to be to arrange Parliament Hall debates, and if the arrangement of the debates should ultimately be their responsibility, then that's what the Convenor should do - arrange them, including the central responsibility of booking speakers and making sure they turn up. I think that to dilute this role by haphazardly spinning off the job of booking speakers is a mistake.
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Psalm 91:7
Psalm 91:7