DCUSU president apologises for misleading college over Old Bar

The president of the DCU Students’ Union has apologised for misleading students in relation to the future of the Old Bar.

DCUSU has come under criticism for not keeping students fully informed of the bar’s situation.

Last December the SU announced that Trispace, the company which runs the bar, would be pulling out of its management after incurring major financial losses and that the bar would be closing.

However, more recent developments have seen Trispace continue to run the bar, having decided to open it just one night a week.

Addressing students at a Union Council meeting last Wednesday, McClave apologised to those in attendance. He said: “To be honest we did make a mistake, our communication could’ve been better on this issue and we do have to apologise if people took the wrong impression from what we said before Christmas.”

Speaking to the College View in December, SU president Niall McClave said that “it was a possibility” that the Union would be taking over the bar for semester two.
During the month of January talks were held by the Hub Management Committee to discuss the future of the student bar.

Despite three union members sitting on the committee, including the SU president, the idea of the union running the bar was strongly opposed. During negotiations they came to an agreement which meant that the bar would be continued to be managed by Trispace.

However the first sign of students being informed of the bar’s situation since December was not until an email was sent on February 3. This email contained a link to a topic on the Student Union run life.dcu.ie forum, which generated much debate between members.

The forum was quickly inundated with complaints from students, many of whom felt that they were misinformed about the bar situation.

A total of 1,943 people have viewed the thread so far on life.dcu.ie. Another similar thread on the independent forum site boards.ie has been seen 2,825 times.

One student posted: “Why weren’t we [the students] kept updated on the issue? This thread was only opened as far as I can see after the decision was made. If these discussions were going on and were (obviously) going badly, we should have been told, rather than waiting until a decision was made.”

It was not until a week later, after the forum had received more than fifty posts, that McClave posted his own comment regarding the Old Bar complaints.

At the Union Council meeting the SU president added: “I think what really happened is that we believed in what we were saying and we just made a mistake and we made everyone else believe in it as well.

“We felt it would completely unfair to send out an email about the bar possibly closing forever while people were studying or doing exams and we kind of stick by that decision… We regret we might have got over enthusiastic about an idea and we sold it in the wrong manner.”

McClave told the College View that he would have loved the union to have been able to take over the bar.

He said: “It’s unfortunate that we didn’t get to take over the bar. However this was due to a mixture of two things. Firstly, some members of the Hub Management weren’t crazy on the idea of us running it. Secondly, when we came back after Christmas and looked at the books it just wasn’t looking like it was feasible.

“It would have been too much of a risk to put union money into it that we might not ever have gotten back. We would be losing student money on the bar and we just didn’t feel it was acceptable.”

The Hub Management Committee made the decision to open the Old Bar on Tuesdays only, but who sits on it?

• Martin Conry – Secretary of the university
• Claire Bohan – Director of student support and development
• Mary Cunningham – Head of Campus Residences
• Eamonn Cuggy – Representative from the finance department
• Niall McClave – SU president
• Alan Keegan - Societies and Publications Committee (SPC) chair
• Eoin Cleary - Sports Clubs Committee (SCC) chair
• Una Redmond – Manager of the office of student life

And what do they have to say about the bar?

Martin Conry

“It’s better to give them just one night a week than none at all… we don’t want to offer drink promotions as the government doesn’t approve of this in student bars.”

Alan Keegan

“The bar was losing money left, right and centre… it was the only decision we could come up with. Tuesday nights do seem to be taking off but it’s too early to tell if having the bar open just one night a week is affecting student life on campus.”

Niall McClave

“This is a temporary solution until the end of the semester just to keep the bar open… next year we hope we will get a bar that is open full time and is making money. Hopefully an outside party will take it over but those who have seen the books so far have ran a mile.”

Una Redmond

“If it does well I think we might look at a second night but that’s very much up to the students and if they frequent it… it’s too early to say if we made the right decision as it’s [only] after opening and taking off.”