Petition to ‘Save Mandela Hall’ as Queen's University considers Students' Union redevelopment

A petition has been launched to ‘save Mandela Hall (and it’s sister venues The Speakeasy, Bunatee Bar and Bar Sub)…from potential demolition’ as the University considers proposals for a possible new Student Centre.

The Mandela Hall and it’s associated venues have a long history of hosting major, international touring artists as well as providing a stage for local and national acts. Radiohead played the Mandela Hall – days in advance of their legendary Glastonbury headline set in 1997 - it was the venue for the Little Solidarity series of gigs in 2008 and is home to the long running Shine club nights.

Radar, the live music night which ceased in October last year, ran for 10 years in the Student’s Union and was often responsible for giving bands their first experience with larger scale production.

Nearly 7,000 people have signed the call for the renowned venues to be spared in any plans for redevelopment.

The University has placed a tender for an integrated student centre with a statement saying “The University has initiated a project involving all the relevant stakeholders, including the Students’ Union, to explore the potential development of an Integrated Student Centre.” It continues that the project “has the potential to deliver an integrated hub for student services – this project remains very much at the pre-feasibility and concept stage.”

In a statement, Student’s Union president Caoimhe McNeill said “The conversation about the need for the redevelopment of the Students’ Union started in 2011 based on feedback from our students in several of our annual student surveys. The feedback highlighted that our students want to see investment and improvements to the Students’ Union building. Based on this the University embarked on a feasibility project in partnership with the Students’ Union and I have been involved in the project, both during my time as Student Officer for Equality & Diversity and now as President. It’s a project very much in the early stages but my priority is, of course, to ensure that if the redevelopment goes ahead that it serves the needs of Queen’s students and provides them with a full range of support, advice, representational, developmental and commercial services that will significantly enhance their experience at Queen’s."

Pleasure Beach, Walking on Cars, John Grant, Wolf Alice and Jess Glynn are some of the acts scheduled to play the venues within the Union over the coming months.