Annual General Election

[jeeves]

Aye, you can't stop someone expressing an opinion or declaring who they are going to support - but you can quite easily stop them from actively campaigning...

How? If you can work out a way that would work I'd love to know, because it probably woould help in many ways. But then what counts as 'actively campaigning' do you mean proposing, or flyering, or designing a poster, or telling mate who to vote for. We talked this year about changing rules around postering and such like but anything that was disscussed was so full of loop holes as to be pointless. In the end we reduced the budgets to further increase the affordability of an election campaign. Any other ideas as to how to make campaigning fairer would be well recieved,

[endless psych]

How? If you can work out a way that would work I'd love to know, because it probably woould help in many ways. But then what counts as 'actively campaigning' do you mean proposing, or flyering, or designing a poster, or telling mate who to vote for. We talked this year about changing rules around postering and such like but anything that was disscussed was so full of loop holes as to be pointless. In the end we reduced the budgets to further increase the affordability of an election campaign. Any other ideas as to how to make campaigning fairer would be well recieved,

"Actively campaiging" on election day is the one I would focus on. Sure have BM's give advice, voice their opinion - but as election day is really the only day that 99.9% of QM current student members even notice an election is on (thats if 99.9% of QM members go anywhere near the Union...). If you just stopped QM board members flyering on that day - or standing outside the Union shouting about their support for a particular candidate it would make a large difference.

[spoonie]

members of staff are not allowed to be seen actively campaigning on election days. same goes for BOM. simple.

/x

[GordonBrady]

Like Joe said, changing how elections are run was brought up this year, was discussed at great length and the only change that weas really made was lowering the budgets. If a board member wants to support a candidate, then they should be allowed to actively campaign if they wish.
Board members in general are very opinionated on these issues, they believe someone is the best person for the job, they will want whats best for the Union, and will wish to help with the campaign. I don't think there is any fair way to limit them.

In other news, I have finally officially announced on Myspace and bebo that I am running for President, but I believe most people knew this was my plan for a long time now. I will have a manifest in good time, and I'llbe sure to keep qmunity posted. If you have any questions go ahead, I like the electronic Heckling meeting idea.

Who else is running for the other positions? Are we going to have more than one contested election?

Gordon

[gill turnbull]

members of staff are not allowed to be seen actively campaigning on election days. same goes for BOM. simple.

/x

Student staff can campaign on election days as long as they are not working or in staff clothing during hours of polling. I'm not sure if this was the case when you were staff or board, Spoons, but it's in the new staff handbook.

[jeeves]

Student staff can campaign on election days as long as they are not working or in staff clothing during hours of polling. I'm not sure if this was the case when you were staff or board, Spoons, but it's in the new staff handbook.

And equally, while I'm not sure if it's written down anywhere we are at least trying to prevent qm branded clothing (i.e. board/freshers' week t-shirts) being worn as either this or staff uniforms may suggest a qm endorsement of a candidate.

[Petey]

That's more of a gentlemanly thing though, perhaps?

The FW t-shirt thing could be taken in two ways - either someone sees it and thinks "ohh that person's already been doing their bit for the union - I'll vote for them", or in the way you put it.

[gill turnbull]

And equally, while I'm not sure if it's written down anywhere we are at least trying to prevent qm branded clothing (i.e. board/freshers' week t-shirts) being worn as either this or staff uniforms may suggest a qm endorsement of a candidate.

we who? the board have been in agreement that fresher helper clothing is perfectly acceptable wear on election day, although board tshirts are not. if you are unclear on this i'll be happy to discuss it somewhere else.

[spoonie]

Student staff can campaign on election days as long as they are not working or in staff clothing during hours of polling. I'm not sure if this was the case when you were staff or board, Spoons, but it's in the new staff handbook.

yeah, that's a change. it was a big thing back in the day.
i guess this is something i'll have to agree to disagree on but none of the candidates seem to fussed so all the better

/x

[gill turnbull]

yeah, i think it got changed in the most recent changes in staff rules. i think (and i might be wrong) that the trade union was concerned about preventing staff who are also members from getting involved in the democratic process.

[gary_harlow]

In the end we reduced the budgets to further increase the affordability of an election campaign

Is this still at £20 for ord. board? I remember talk in CBP about reducing it to £10 (I have labs when CBP is on now) but i don't recall it at a board meeting. I hope its still large enough so people can afford flyer's and sweets, because i want sweets :P

Oh and you might have guessed from the above question i'm running for ordinary board again

[ally.h]

it is your destiny!

al.

[jeeves]

Is this still at £20 for ord. board? I remember talk in CBP about reducing it to £10 (I have labs when CBP is on now) but i don't recall it at a board meeting. I hope its still large enough so people can afford flyer's and sweets, because i want sweets :P

Oh and you might have guessed from the above question i'm running for ordinary board again

Pretty sure it's 20 for ord board and 40 for everyone else. On the subject of fw helper t-shirts etc, sorry to anyone that go confused but I just wrote what I thought was the current understanding. Unfortunately just like everyone else, I've been known to make mistakes.

[spoonie]

i don't make mistakes, i just get fed bad information or insensitive souls change the rules when they're no use to me any more!

[erithromycin]

Preventing people from wearing Freshers' Week T-Shirts when they are running for Board is an idea whose merits can be found in the big book of evaluation, somewhere between 'stupid' and 'useless'.

In these days of 'a degree is not enough' and transferable skills to limit the utility of someone's time spent as a Freshers' Helper to a pat on the back for a job well done, a beverage of their choice, and a T-Shirt that they cannot wear to link themselves to past service to the Union when there is no similar proscription in the creation of their manifestos, and, indeed, nor should there be, is just daft.

As for Board Members backing candidates, I believe that the rules regarding elections have stood quite happily for decades, if not over a century, with little difficulty. There have been lots of elections, very few problems as a percentage, and to legislate for rarity is to invite chaos.

With regards to Staff who also happen to be members, it has long been the intent that they be construed as seperate entities which happen to inhabit one body. With regards to Elections their role as staff should not disenfranchise them as Members, and that must extent to campaigning, but they must not be identifiable as staff in terms of uniform. It's a little silly, I'll admit, but the only realistic alternative would be preventing members from joining staff or the reverse, because that's the only way to keep the populations exclusive.

Personally, I want a return to the good old days, when everything was better. Failing that, I want people to suck it up and move on.

There's an election coming. I want knife fighting and balloons.