The Principal and Bursar of St Anne’s College came under fire from students angry over the lack of heating in a College accommodation block. On Sunday’s JCR meeting, students demanded to know if they would be financially compensated after three out of four boilers failed in the Ruth Deech building, which left them without heating in noughth week .Additionally a burst pipe flooded much of the first floor of the building. The College Domestic Bursar, Martin Jackson, explained, “We’ve suffered a whole series of boiler failures over the Christmas period. That wasn’t something I expected.” In noughth week Jackson emailed St Anne’s students to say that they were experiencing problems but that the system would be fixed by Friday. However five days later on 14 January, he emailed students again, saying, “The part needed to revive three of the four boilers is not available in this country and is being sent from Germany.” He reassured students that the College was “examining urgent alternative sources of heat”. Pru Buxton, a second year living in the Ruth Deech building, first raised the issue with the College. She said that assurances that the heating would be fixed had prompted her not to bring her own heater and that she had been inconvenienced by the matter. 80 electric heaters were then bought and distributed to the students living in the Ruth Deech building. However it later emerged that 18 conference guests were moved out of their non-heated rooms and offered alternative accommodation whereas students were not.In response to this revelation, Jackson told the common room, “That particular group had paid a very large amount of money and we would be in breach of contact if we did not provide those facilities.”
St Anne’s JCR President Amaru Villanueva Rance said, “We aren’t considering accusing the College staff of negligence as we don’t think this is the issue. Going down this route would damage our relations with them and would be ultimately unproductive. “We are satisfied that they have dealt with the issue of repairing the boilers as best they could. We are trying to look at our tenancy agreements to see what students are legally entitled to in terms of compensation. To this effect, we will seek legal advice from OUSU and the Citizens Advice Bureau, as we believe liability falls on the College.”
Floods and heating failure at Anne’s
