Today the VP of Student Activities announced on the 2017-2018 Freshers page that the University is contemplating charging an annual facilities fee of £99 per person, for anyone participating on Essex Blades sports clubs and teams.

According to the VP, this fee will not be used to upgrade existing facilities for the Essex Blades. As of now, no facility utilised by the Essex Blades are scheduled for an improvement.
This new fee will be a major obstacle to overcome to maintain team/club returner memberships and to gain new Freshers to replace outgoing club members.
This may lead to a lack of new/returning members which may increase club costs, for those who are able and willing to pay the £99 fee, as there will be less money pooled to offset club expenses.
The University, also, is not taking individual costs in participating in a sport into account. Each sport/club has unique costs that are incurred throughout the year, which already may be prohibitively expensive to allow for returners or freshers to compete. An extra £99 on top of these costs is easily viewed as excessive.

This fee is being proposed and negotiated without any input from students and with no regard to the elected Student Parliament. This proposal should have been brought to our attention during the previous year, giving the student body time to evaluate said proposal. The University of Essex must show regard for the input of its students.

It is our view that "Free Play" is an important policy to maintain for every current and future student at the University of Essex.