Association Elections October 2006

[Al]

Well, the people in private accommodation used to make up "Crichton Montrose Society". Why shouldn't they have representation on the SRC? Every other half-baked, imaginary interest group does. But you make your silly comments. That'll help reverse the decline of the SRC. It's odd how the old composition of the SRC worked well on the whole. There was certainly more competition for posts. I am sure that it is no coincidence that the SRC began its slide to irrelevance at the same time as the pointless overhaul of its composition.

[exnihilo]

Crichton Montrose used to work perfectly well, and be competed for. Why people with no recollection of it see fit to mock it so often puzzles me.

Al's right, the SRC has changed size, shape and composition so often recently that there hasn't been a proper constitution for almost a decade. Every time something's not working, there's a rejig rather than any attempt to make it work.

[Lid]

Quoting exnihilo from 23:45, 12th Oct 2006
Crichton Montrose used to work perfectly well, and be competed for. Why people with no recollection of it see fit to mock it so often puzzles me.

I was actually being serious, and would love to see a Crichton Montrose Society.

[hr]

We are not drunks, we are multi-millionaires

[exnihilo]

Good man. Apologies, then.

[maenad]

I have thought about getting involved but I'm struggling to find out what these people actually *do*. Is it something worthwhile? Or is it just so you can have something fancy on your CV?

[hr]

Tommy can you hear me?

[Lid]

If you're thinking of running, my advice would be to come into the general office tomorrow and speak to an elections officer about what each position does, and what SRC / SSC does.

What each post consists of varies post-to-post, and obviously an officer cannot tell you which post to run for, but their advice on the roles of each position would probably help you make your mind up either way.

Incidentally, a brief guide to each position and the remit is available at http://www.yourunion.net/files/Candidat ... 202006.pdf


[hr]

We are not drunks, we are multi-millionaires

[Bryn]

Why don't all those complaining about uncontested elections either run, or find someone to run?

[David Bean]

Well, several of them aren't actually students, and whilst it'f be great to have a Member for Life Members (as it were), we don't, at the moment.

We do have a proper constitution for the SRC now - wrote it myself - but it's still not very good, largely because when Ben Spires 'reformed' the SRC a few years ago he did it with the direct intention of buggering the body up, and when Ben Reilly proposed what I thought was a pretty good and sensible package of reforms at the start of the last year, the SRC as it stood rejected them, which I thought was pretty silly. But never mind.

As to the list of candidates, it's a bit sparse, I know, in some cases for specific reasons (e.g. Caroline is running unopposed for Volunteering because she's been acting in the job for several months anyway, but this was the first general election since Faith stepped down, so there was no prior opportunity to formalise it) but there look to be a couple of good fights in there. Williams versus Haraldsen should be a particularly entertaining contest, so look forward to that, and it's also interesting to note that the roles with the more functional remits, like Community Relations (everybody write in Sarah Louise Flowers!) and Widening Access are all opposed.

Good luck to everyone - particularly the ever-maligned Election Officers...

[hr]

Psalm 91:7

[Elections Officer]

Nominations have now closed and the final list of candidates can be found here:

http://www.yourunion.net/content/index.php?page=6039

Full details of the hecklings will be made public over the weekend, but they are scheduled for Monday night 6pm to 8:30pm and Tuesday night 6pm until 9:30pm, both in Venue 1.

And thanks for your best wishes, David

Adam Fellows
SEO

[hr]

Election Officers Committee
University of St Andrews Students' Association
St Mary's Place
St Andrews
KY16 9UZ

[exnihilo]

Just in response to one thing David said, I think it's a terrible shame that the General Council no longer has a direct representation in the Association since the rejig of the Association Board. A sad loss.

[Jono]

out of curiosity, what happens to the positions without any candidates? do they lapse, or stay empty?

[hr]

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[Elections Officer]

They will be co-opted at a future SRC. Member posts can be co-opted, but officer positions have to be filled by an election.

[hr]

Election Officers Committee
University of St Andrews Students' Association
St Mary's Place
St Andrews
KY16 9UZ

[puzzled]

Quoting Lid from 22:44, 12th Oct 2006

It is a shame that so few of these are uncontested. I do wish that more were, I really do. But, how can you make people run for stuff, if they do not want, nor have the will to?

1. Abolish the special interest groups' reps

2. Reform the SRC so it consists of the sabs and 2 representatives per year (+2 for post grads) - this would make it more obvious as to what people were voting for.

3. Abolish most if not all of the elections rules - the laws of the land are more than sufficient. This would mean that elections would be more vibrant and turnout would increase.

4. Stop the non-hierarchy bullshit - there needs to be someone at the top of the pile to bang heads together.

5. Stop devoting anytime to non university business (thankfully not even the SRC are quite as bad as the NUS in this regard, at least they haven't started pontificating on world affaires as if they had any influence on them)- the SRC has no power to influence anyone other than the university and possibly the council (if they're lucky). Student politicians don't like to admit this, but it's true.

[RJ Covino]

Quoting David Bean from 16:59, 13th Oct 2006
when Ben Spires 'reformed' the SRC a few years ago he did it with the direct intention of buggering the body up

As one of the architects of the present system, I really do defy you, David, to back that statement up with fact.

[hr]

http://www.ralphcovino.com

[exnihilo]

I agree with much of what puzzled says, though I would have a few portfolio based officers in addition to those mentioned.

Most of all I agree about the moronic election rules; wildly, wildly over-prescriptive and just begging for people to argue the letter rather than the spirit. All the specific items banned are absurd. The law of the land more than covers it all already, with perhaps the addition of non-members not being allowed to involve themselves.

Amusingly, our SRC used to be just as bad as the NUS for messing about, there was once a motion to write to Slobodan Milosevic condemning the bombing in the Balkans. The story runs that when the President of Glasgow's SRC heard this he said "why, did they bomb a pier?"



(Edit: PS I'm surprised to hear you claiming credit, Ralph, for what is, frankly, an administrative abortion.)

[Cain]

Furthermore, there was no such chap as Ben 'Spires' (sic).

It was Spiers, wasn't it?

[hr]

I hold an element of surprise

[Jono]

As I've said before; I don't want someone with enormous skelletons in their closetrunning shit in the union. Why shouldn't candidates be allowed to run factually true negative campaigning? That way we can keep the real undesirables out of positions of power!

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[Jono]

Quoting Cain from 23:34, 13th Oct 2006
Furthermore, there was no such chap as Ben 'Spires' (sic).

It was Spiers, wasn't it?

[hr]

I hold an element of surprise

p.s. you're being a pedantic git!

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[Cain]

Quoting jono from 00:53, 14th Oct 2006
p.s. you're being a pedantic git!

Well, one of those options was his name, and one wasn't.



[hr]

I hold an element of surprise

[Jono]

Quoting Cain from 00:55, 14th Oct 2006

Quoting jono from 00:53, 14th Oct 2006
p.s. you're being a pedantic git!

Well, one of those options was his name, and one wasn't.



[hr]

I hold an element of surprise

Interesting.... And still, you're being a pedant!

[hr]

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