SU voting opens with faceless candidates

by Maryse Farag

The manifestos for the 36 candidates running in the Students' Union (SU) elections have been revealed in a cloud of controversy after it was revealed that photographs of the hopefuls will not be published by the SU.

In an effort to avoid votes for appearance rather than policy, the SU have decided not to show photographs of the candidates on their website, although the majority of the candidates had no objections to having their pictures taken for Arts London News.

This will be the first year in which the new 'fair' policy is adopted.

Kit Friend, Campaigns and Communications Officer for the SU told Arts London News: “The SU want to move away from students voting on appearances, so the new policy is to try and move away from photos of candidates.

"They should be judged based on the merits of their pledges not their appearance. It's not a decision based on suspicion of past bias, but rather moral principle. Our elections have changed year on year - this is just one of many improvements."

Friend denied that the current SU team has been elected for aesthetic reasons, saying: "All the current team were voted in by their policy and manifesto during their campaigning."

Posters featuring the faces of some of the candidates have already started to appear around the UAL.

'Record breaking'

Candidates are competing for four full-time paid sabbatical positions on a salary of £21,000, and a further 15 part-time unpaid posts.

Overall, 36 candidates have put their names forward for the roles, of which 20 applied for the paid, sabbatical positions, with the remaining 15 going for the unpaid roles.

Candidate numbers have increased significantly for sabbatical positions this year, with a "record breaking number of students nominating themselves" according to SU President, Helen Gimber.

“More students have been involved in the union this year than in previous years, following an increase in our campaigning work, the development of the sports and societies, as well as more student events and services,” she said.

However, Lubaina Mirza, who is applying for the post of Education Officer disagrees, telling ALN: “I know I won’t find a job easily when I graduate and knowing the pay for the positions are so attractive, it’s hard not to go for it.”

Voting takes place online and is open now until noon March 5.

Voting system

Candidates are ranked in preference order, rather than voters selecting a single candidate.

All 'first preference' votes are counted for each candidate.

The candidate with the lowest number of 'first preference' votes is eliminated.

The 'second preference' of those who initially chose the now eliminated candidate as their 'first preference' are re­distributed to the remaining candidates.

This process of redistributing the second 'preference votes' of eliminated candidates is repeated until one candidate has met the number of votes required by the quota and so the winning candidates are elected to office.

For more information on each candidate, please visit this site.