Lincoln College Students' Association Presidency 1972 - Warren Burge

The initiative for v​arious policy resolutions could be activist Executive members or students, NZUSA and undoubtedly myself. One example of this is a telegram from an Officer of NZUSA.

I am reminded by ex-student friends that in order to ‘silence’ the large gathering of students preparatory to opening one general meeting I fired a .303 rifle blank in the Lincoln Union auditorium. Not only was the ​explosive sound deafening but the ensuing silence was equally remarkable. Having obtained order I declared the meeting open and got down to the business.

 

The ’73 Springbok Rugby Tour

A South African ‘Springbok’ Rugby team was scheduled to tour New Zealand in 1973 at the invitation of the NZ Rugby Union. Lincoln students voted at a general meeting in 1972 to reverse the then existing policy supporting sports contacts with South Africa. It was a matter that was debated vigorously. But at a special meeting and by a 2:1 majority, students voted for a motion proposed by two senior Lincoln Rugby players – Al McLennan and Stu Murray - to ‘not support the 1973 tour’ (F15).

It was a convincing policy reversal and occurred in spite of some Lincoln staff (ER March) who coached senior rugby teams encouraging players to vote against the motion. As a result of the Association’s revised policy, New Zealand student associations were united in opposing or not supporting the ’73 Tour which Prime Minister Norman Kirk would eventually delay.

The vote to ‘not support’ the Tour lent support for the Association’s existing policy calling for an end to all commercial and diplomatic relations with South Africa because of its apartheid regime. Contrarily, an Association general meeting in 1972 continued to support the sale of Rothmans cigarettes on campus and to receive a payment of $90 toward the production costs of the Association newspaper ‘Caclin’. Rothmans was owned by Rembrandt – a South African company. As I recall, the Executive overlooked invoicing Rothmans for the sum that year.

 

French Nuclear Tests in the Pacific

The French government’s testing of nuclear devices at the Tahitian atoll Mururoa attracted the ire of Lincoln students - Association policy opposed these tests and the Executive encouraged students to join a public protest march which it organised in June (ER June).

1972 saw the beginning of the Greenpeace and NZ Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament protests against nuclear testing in the Pacific. However, it was not until January 1996 that the French government dismantled its nuclear testing facilities in Tahiti.

 

The Vietnam War

Since 1963 New Zealand had supported its ANZUS partners by providing military and civilian support in the Vietnam War. Even though by 1972 New Zealand had withdrawn its combat units and replaced them with training teams public protests continued against the War. The LCSA’s policy opposed the War which enabled it to support protest activity against it. In Christchurch this culminated in a large public mobilization in July, attracting between 3000 – 5000 people (F18).

In December 1972, the newly elected Labour Government withdrew the training teams from Vietnam.

 

Other Policies

Other Association policies opposed Ian Smith’s Rhodesian Front government in Southern Rhodesia which had unilaterally declared independence in 1965. The RFG did this in an attempt to preserve the dominance of the white settlers in the country’s economic and political spheres. Judith Todd a political activist and daughter of Garfield Todd the Prime Minister of Rhodesia in the 1950s wrote expressing her appreciation for LCSA’s policy stance.

On the other hand, Association policies supported the recognition of ‘Red China’ and the reform of a host of New Zealand laws which outlawed homosexuality between consenting adults, abortion, and personal use of marijuana. It donated funds to Waikato University’s newly established Centre of Māori Studies, Greenpeace, and toward a National Māori Language Day (F22). Modest financial support was also given to Canterbury Ecology Action (F7, F10).

 

Campus Architecture

Trengrove Trengrove and Marshall were the College’s architects. There was a view among some students reflected in a policy that the administration should invite more architects to submit designs for future buildings. The belief was that the College architects ‘had it too easy’ and there was too much ‘red brick’ on Campus (ER July, ER Aug, F21). Registrar Hunt batted away our concerns.

 

Anzac Day

R.O. (‘Bob’) Campbell, a ‘Rural Field Cadet’ and stand-out Dip. Ag. student, led a group of Lincoln students in laying a wreath at the RSA’s Anzac Day ceremony in Cathedral Square. It was not without controversy. The local RSA Executive supported the move initially, but a number of vocal RSA members opposed the laying of wreaths other than their own Association’s. On the day, returned soldiers formed a cordon around the Citizens War Memorial to stop students and others laying wreaths. It was complicated by the presence of the ‘PYM’ – the Progressive Youth Movement - with which Lincoln students had no truck. Invariably, it ended in a squirmish between proud soldiers and the younger generation that was caught by TV cameras and later reported in news articles. The message on the Association’s wreath was – ‘To all those that have died for the cause of freedom’ (F6).

 

MEETING WITH THE PRIME MINISTER

In July and under the aegis of NZUSA a small number of student association presidents including myself met with Prime Minister Jack Marshall to talk about, in his words, ‘why youth was not using the “normal channels” through which to register their grievances’ and a handful of other issues. In Ferment 17, I said there was a ‘very obvious difference in opinion between the Prime Minister and the students on what actually constituted democracy.’ ‘Gentleman Jack’ Marshall, I recall, was distinctly uncomfortable with the idea of homosexuality and any notion of reforming the law at that time.

 

MORE SAY IN COLLEGE AFFAIRS

The ‘College Magazine’ in 1972 and 1973 record that students were nominated onto eight College ‘committees’ – that meant that a student voice was heard on virtually all of the critical decision making bodies. Further, senior management agreed that the official College ‘Calendar’ would from 1973 contain the names of students on the LCSA Executive and the various College Committees (ER September). The College Magazine had been doing this for a number of years but in those days the College ‘Calendar’ was the all-important official document.

 

The College Council

By 1971 the College Council, which comprised 17 members, had agreed to ‘co-opt’ the Association’s President allowing him or her to attend its monthly meetings with ‘speaking rights’ but without the right to vote. Ross Gunn, senior scholar, was the first President to take a seat at its table in the meeting room atop the Hilgendorf Building.

A couple of things come to mind about those meetings. At one meeting the Council Chair reminded me that I was a ‘nominee’ of the Association not its ‘representative’. It must have been during a discussion when I was giving voice to an Association’s policy when Hon. J.K. McAlpine informed me that as a ‘nominee’ my role was not limited to one of simply expressing or promoting the Association’s views.

The General Election in November 1972 saw the Labour Party led by Norman Kirk defeat the National Party which had been in power since 1960. Earlier, M.A (‘Mick’) Connelly, the Labour MP for Wigram had been elected to the Council by the Members of Parliament for the South Island. At a meeting shortly after Mick joined the Council he either asked a pointed question or expressed a contrary view. The response to this was for one or two longstanding Council members to hiss audibly rather than comment or debate the issue he had raised. It’s worth recalling that by the time of the November Election, the National Party had been on the Government benches for 12 years and many of its MPS were drawn from the farming sector.

 

Professorial Board

At the start of 1972 student associations at three Universities had secured representation on professorial boards and so it was inevitable at Lincoln that there would be a push for the same. Ultimately it would be the Council that would decide if this would be the case – after consulting with the Lincoln’s Professorial Board. I prepared a lengthy submission and spoke to it at the September meeting of the Board. At the meeting I recall the Reader in Landscape Design Charlie Challenger summing up our submission with the rhetorical question – ‘so you would say there should be no taxation without representation’, echoing the cries of the early Colonists in the United States. It was a point that got to the heart of the matter and which I should have quoted in support of the submission I thought at the time. Subsequently, with a positive recommendation from the Board, the Council agreed that a senior student nominated by the Association be co-opted as a member of the Board (F25). 

W.W. (‘Bill’) Lee. a good all-rounder senior degree student was duly co-opted on the Executive’s recommendation (F27).

 

Faculty

Later in the year the academic staff resolved to extend the membership of ‘Faculty’ to include three representatives of the Association (ER December).

 

Student Feedback – ‘Bitch Sessions’

The Executive organised ‘Bitch Sessions’ during which students could suggest improvements to courses and the programmes in which they were enrolled (ER June, ER November). The Diploma Ag. and Hort. sessions were the first to be held – members of the Executive chaired these and subsequent sessions (F11, F13).

Individual students were not reluctant to leave notes expressing their views under the door of my office. The feedback that appeared under the office door was quite diverse in tone if not in content.

 

The College Council – its Policy on Apartheid

What follows is an interesting story of how Sir Malcolm and a Council colleague facilitated the adoption by the Council of an Association policy on the matter of apartheid in education in South Africa. It took place at the Council’s September meeting.

Earlier, I had raised at the Council’s July meeting student concerns about the South African government’s apartheid-related actions in that country’s university education. The Council deferred voting on this motion which ‘deplored’ the actions of the South African government partly because a meeting of the Lincoln AUT (‘Association of University Teachers’) had earlier rejected the same motion (F13).

The July Council meeting sought direct evidence of the alleged SA government actions from that country’s universities. It was a task I was keen to embark on. From memory I sought and received letters from three leading universities which provided that evidence and stated they would welcome the College Council taking a stand on the matter.

It should be remembered that the student President did not have voting rights on the College Council and that obviously extended to the matter of proposing motions. Armed with my letters from the South African Vice Chancellors, I met with Sir Malcolm seeking his support which he duly gave. It is evidenced by memos he sent over to me.

In September the Council – possibly the first University Council in New Zealand– would adopt this resolution –

That this Council recognising that a policy of Government enforced discrimination in education based on racial and any other grounds is contrary to the principles of academic freedom and university autonomy deplores (1) the implementation of this policy by any government, and (2) the action taken by the South African authorities in suppressing recent demonstrations which aimed at drawing attention to severe irregularities in South African education facilities provided for the different races (ER September, F25).

 

ASSOCIATION PUBLICATIONS

Forty-seven years on, I am surprised by how much I wrote and published as student President. My weekly newsletter ‘Ferment’ was written obviously for students and, as I wrote in the first issue ‘…to keep you informed of the activities, thoughts and fetishes flowing to and from the little room…’ It was an innovative move and the only one of its kind on any New Zealand campus that year (F21).

But, in conceiving of ‘Ferment’ I suspect I was well aware of the periodic nature of the Association’s newspaper ‘Caclin’ (seven issues were published in 1972) and that I was not going to rely on it to keep students informed. Besides, I had editorial control over ‘Ferment’ for better or worse. By the end of 1972 I had written 30 foolscap issues which had become as widely read by staff and it was by students.

With the Association Executive in mind, I prepared reports and encouraged other Executive members to do the same ahead of our monthly meetings. Interestingly, copies were also distributed to the College Council Secretary and the Principal (F14). 

In the January 1972 issue I wrote, ‘… past reports of the year’s activities of the LCSA Executive have been, for all intents and purposes, extremely brief and non-personal. I expect, as a result of having monthly reports, that the records available to Old Boys (sic) and students of the future will prove more personal and enlightening as a consequence of the detail’ (ER January).

Almost half a century later, I am left reflecting - was that not just a little too optimistic?

 

‘Hot Line’

I don’t doubt that I had in mind the cover of the Rolling Stones album ‘Sticky Fingers’ when developing the cover for the Association’s student telephone directory – ‘HotLine'. 

The photographer was Euan Sarginson, an eminent and fashionable Christchurch photographer and I was the ‘model’. Euan and I subsequently worked on the official photograph of the Executive which was to be a real departure from the staid material that preceded it.

Students happily supplied their names, phone numbers and addresses for this directory that would be seen in scores of flats and hostel rooms. It also provided information on tenancy rights, legal help and the like, and advertising covered the cost of its production (ER May).

 

Capping Magazine - ‘Ram’

The Association’s first and subsequent capping magazines were probably the least literary and political of the half dozen or so that flooded cities and towns during the May ‘capping week.’ In other words, ours was just plain ‘grubby’. The Association’s inaugural 1971 edition was called ‘Pizzlerot’ – a name that was to prove short-lived. It was referred to the Indecent Publications Tribunal which was to state it was ‘disgusting and unpleasant but we do not consider harmful’ but ruled it ‘indecent for people under 16 years old.’ Several letters (Hunt to Ross Gunn, letter to the tribunal) and a memo flowed between the Tribunal, the Association, and the Association’s lawyer. Not all of the feedback was negative though. 

The College’s Professorial Board weighed in too and Sir Malcolm sought a meeting to convince me that a name change for our capping mag was in order. Registrar Hunt had a thing or two to say too. Quite independently of their representations I had already decided that from a marketing perspective a shorter sharper name was called for, but one with an agricultural tone. ‘Ram’ was the name I preferred, and so in 1972 the magazine hit the streets with that name (ER January).

In 1972, scores of Lincoln students hit the streets, invading all manner of workplaces and other spaces to sell 60,000 copies. At 40 cents a copy the Association was the richer by a net $11000 which excluded the $3000 it donated to the Christchurch Commonwealth Games. The quid pro quo was the Games’ Appeal Committee allowed the Association to use its name and ensign in advertising and promoting ‘Ram’. Considerable effort was devoted to organizing the sale of our capping magazine as the record shows. It had its own paid editor and group of contributors. Students got five cents for each copy sold and subsidized entry into the Ram Piss Up and Ram Ball (F6). 

The Executive tried to get together with student leaders at Massey University to cooperate in a joint sales strategy as evidenced by this memo. ‘Masquerade’ was viewed as our main competitor and it could enlist the skills of one Tom Scott – who went on to become a world class cartoonist.

One of my arguments in support of the Association publishing a capping mag was that it would generate revenue to supplement the fee income which the Association derived from student membership fees. In 1972, that fee was $22 per student. Fees generated an income of $22,750 which was historically split almost equally between operating expenses and a building fund that helped finance the ‘Lincoln Union’.

 

Open Day Booklet

A good example of how the Executive worked with the Administration, was when the College opened its gates to the farming community and public for the first time in late March 1972. Lincoln students were there to lend a hand. The Executive published a souvenir ‘Open Day Booklet’ with a stylish blue, gold and white cover, and organised student guides to show groups the finer points of the Campus and its facilities (F1). Sir Malcolm was quick to record his appreciation for the Association’s contribution to the day.

 

OTHER STUDENT ISSUES

Condoms or Calculators on Campus?

As a result of the installation of CVM’s on other campuses the question arose at Lincoln as to whether a condom vending machine should be installed on Campus. Was there an un-met demand for the product of such a machine at Lincoln? There was no resolution to the issue in ’72 and it was to be become a matter with which Stuart Hight as President and his Executive would have to grapple in the following year. But, at the time I was told that in 1962 the student canteen had sold condoms until the Master of Halls had ‘confiscated the lot’ (F17).

If there was uncertainty on that issue there was none on the matter of the College providing calculators on Campus. This was an on-going grievance for students throughout the year. The Association won the provision of one calculator which was installed in the College Library. Pressure from students and representations by the Executive led to the Administration providing five in the following year (F6, F28).

 

Drugs – no thank you

‘The student at Lincoln College likely to consume marijuana is one who typically is above 21 years of age; lives in a flat; is pursuing a post graduate course, or has completed at least two years at the College…’ An unpublished report also said ‘of the 266 who completed the questionnaire, 50 or approximately 19% of those surveyed admitted using marijuana.’

This was a key conclusion based on the data derived from the ‘Rooster’ questionnaire. There were about 690 students on Campus when ‘Rooster’ was distributed but the timing of its distribution late in the academic year precluded Diploma students from responding to it. Drug use was only one of a number of issues surveyed by what was a large questionnaire: 60 questions on subjects ranging accommodation, transport, the 1973 Springbok Tour, drug use, and Library usage (ER October).

 

Social Events

The newly completed ‘Lincoln Union’ or, as it was more commonly called, ‘Student Union’ building altered dramatically the dynamics of student life and College affairs generally. It provided a decent student ​cafeteria (milk shakes were a big seller); a large auditorium for balls, conferences and examinations; social spaces for ‘steins’ or simply ‘hanging out’; and space for an Association office and pool tables (ER May, ​ER November, ER December).​

The Association paid $89,000 or, in other words one third of the construction cost of the Union Building and a further $28,000 toward the cost of the Squash Courts (F28).​​

​Any activity on ​Campus which involved alcohol such as the ‘Drinking Horn’ and ‘Steins’ required the prior approval of the Professorial Board (ER March, ER June). The Board was q​uite creative on where the​ ‘Drinking Horn’ should be located - on a College paddock adjacent to the Campus – the paddock would take care of the ​inevitable spillages which I imagined ​​​the Board believed would occur. A macabre event ​organised jointly by Lincoln and ​Canterbury university students – the ‘Chunda ​​​​​​Mile’ was held at a ‘secret’ city council park in the City (F5). It is difficult to imagine such an event being sanctioned by the authorities in 2019 – it involved consuming a pie and pint of beer for each 440 yard lap. And, there was a women’s event! Lincoln’s star performer that year was BJ or ‘Knockers’ who at provincial level rugby was a strong fast ​​​​flanker - attributes w​hich had served him well ​in this gruelling event.​​

​​​​​​​​​

​​In a different vein, the selection of Duncan Hales and Ian Hurst for the All Black Squad was acknowledged formally by the Association’s Executive (F25).​

​The Queen’s Birthday honours announced the promotion of Sir Malcolm Burns Principal’s to Knight Commander of the British Empire order. To mark the occasion I encouraged the Executive to organize a ‘Sir Malcolm Burns Celebration Dinner’ in July (F15, ER June, ER July).

​​​​​​Sir Malcolm had a towering presence on Campus and had a tolerant attitude to many of the issues I raised with him on behalf of students. After all, prior to his appointment as Principal he had been active in the Association of University Teachers. It seemed at the time that he and the local Police had an understanding that he would ‘deal’ personally with Lincoln students and their alleged transgressions rather than the authorities. He was known to keep an eye out for what was happening on Campus - it was not u​ncommon to see him taking a walk round the grounds after dark. He and his charming wife Lady Ruth lived in ‘The Lodge’ which was located on Campus.​

 

‘BURNS’… SIR MALCOLM

Sometime later in 1972, Sir Malcolm and I found ourselves on the same NAC (National Airways Corporation) waiting list at Wellington airport for a flight back to Christchurch. It was a cold wintery evening. Eventually, waiting list passengers were called to the traffic counter and Sir Malcolm was asked for his surname. He replied ‘Burns’ and after a well-timed pause added in an authoritative voice ‘Sir Malcolm’ upon which he was issued with a ticket. As he stepped aside to allow me to approach the counter he gave me a look as if to say ‘You should try it.’ I didn’t, and I duly bided him farewell and thought about where I might cadge a bed for the night.

 

AFTERWORD

I arrived at the College at the start of 1968 as a hybrid ‘Rural Field Cadet’ – one of 'Herbie’s Boys'. A ‘hybrid’ because I had changed academic programmes and enrolled in the B. Agr. Sci. in the latter months of 1967. RFCs would normally arrive at Lincoln having completed two years farm experience, as I had, but enrolled in the Diploma in Agriculture plus Valuation and Farm Management.

By the time I was elected to serve as LCSA’s President in 1972 I had a history of being active in student affairs. Why? I remember at the time thinking that I was never going to ‘stand out’ as a senior scholar or one who would claim a Sports ‘blue’ as had an older cousin of mine and RFC - Cam Mitchell. 

But, I could contribute something to the life of the College, its students and their Association – this I did and thoroughly enjoyed the experiences that flowed from it.

 

 

Warren Burge
November 2019

 

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Referencing notation used in this narrative:

• F1 etc., refers to ‘Ferment Issue 1’
• ER May etc., refers to ‘Executive Report, May’

 

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