SU elections (Full time and part time) **MOD NOTE** POST #1 and #26

Ruire wrote: »

Also, screw that whole 'buses to outside exam centres' lark. If you don't have the brightness to get a bus from Eyre Square to Leisureland, you don't deserve to sit the exam. Especially given that contracting a bus company would be more expensive for everyone.

You're assuming that everyone lives in the centre of town and not out in Knocknacara, Barna, or further afield.

Reillyman wrote: »

Are you saying that the MAP is a form of abortion?

Technically it is since it removes the embryo after implantation or prevents implantation after the zygote has formed. It doesnt prevent conception like condoms for example.

As for men v women in the top job, Muireann O'Dwyer did a great job (even though she ran against two joke candidates that year: best posters ever) as did Donna the year after. Peter was less visible but probably worked as hard. A lot of the things that they worked on are only appearing now and others may be taking credit for only finishing the job, not starting it. (renovating the reading room, more plugs and wifi in the library, microwaves in smokeys, water fountains on the concourse....)

Squeeonline wrote: »

A lot of the things that they worked on are only appearing now and others may be taking credit for only finishing the job, not starting it. (renovating the reading room, more plugs and wifi in the library, microwaves in smokeys, water fountains on the concourse....)

Let's not get carried away pretending that any of those were terribly difficult jobs to complete, now...
Excepting the Reading Room renovation, granted, but that was always on the cards - the place was a complete hole.

That's true. We'd be better off removing administrators than adding more pseudo-administrators of our own...

Squeeonline wrote: »

A lot of the things that they worked on are only appearing now and others may be taking credit for only finishing the job, not starting it. (renovating the reading room, more plugs and wifi in the library, microwaves in smokeys, water fountains on the concourse....)

To add to Ficheall's post, the Wi-Fi upgrade was a campus-wide initiative by ISS. All of the access points on the campus were upgraded to the new white Cisco 802.11n ones that you see now. Nothing to do with the SU.

My own thoughts on each candidate (all of these are my own thoughts and are not meant to insult or denigrate any candidate) This is my last year in NUIG so I'm following this even closer than usual.

O'Brien: Excellent speaker and comes across very well in interviews and debates. Would be a very good spokesperson for the college but has a fierce temper and gets angered easily and so would find it hard to chair the SU.

Curley: Pretty much the anti O'Brien: strong where O'Brien is weak and weak where O'Brien is strong.. Also a very hard worker and has excellent organizational and teamwork abilities and so would do the chairperson aspect of President extremely well. However, he's rough around the edges and so would lose out in terms of being a spokesperson. Also as pro-capitalism as O'Brien is anti-capitalism.

Adebari: Has a serious campaign machine going out and has been planning his campaign all year. Some good ideas (such as handing out business cards with the numbers for support services on them) but can be extremely flippant and abrasive which is dicey territory for a welfare officer where tact and sensibility are crucial for casework.

Allen: Allen is a joker and is usually up to some mischief or another which runs the risk of him not taking the job seriously or offending someone. However, has a track record on welfare issues (such as his campaign on disability when he was Equality Officer and his work on an anonymous nightline for students who need to talk to someone)

McCarthy: Proven track record on campaign issues and would be a great asset for student issues such as where they're being screwed over by an employer or landlord. However, casework is the mainstay of the Welfare position and as such, must be approachable and sympathetic counsellors rather than activists. Would probably have been better going for Education.

Kitt: Personally met one obnoxious canvasser of his but he seems like a genuine and nice guy. Victim of a smear campaign based on his political views but this will likely help him (the same was done against Connolly and Mannion in the past). Has a veritable campaign army out but might lose out on policies, given the importance on third level fees where Kitt has no visible previous involvement.

Stitt: Topped the poll last year and has a long history of student activism as well as behind NUIG Memes (Which seems to be important to students). Rowed with FEE over his netbook scheme (the SU bulk buying netbooks and using the discount to sell them on cheap to students) and ultimately left putting him in no mans land without any real base to draw on aside from personal friends. However, he had little FEE help last year as well so will probably be vying with Kitt for the position.

Reilly: Had never heard of him before this election, has a campaign team out but seems sparse on policies.

Fennelly: FEE's candidate for Education. Has experience in education issues (through involvement with Suas), is an Irish speaker, and has a lot of time to campaign, given she is taking the year out of education. However, she only really burst onto the scene this year and with FEE running 3 candidates, might have her resources and team stretched too thin.

Brusilovskaya: Had never heard of her before the election and has the most low key campaign so far. Will probably place last although might pull out a mature student vote.

bildo wrote: »

It means exactly what is says. Currently SU Commercial services is hardly answerable to the Union at all. There have been a number of issues this year where the Exec has made decisions on certain aspects of their operations which have been completely ignored.
I feel that there are a number of changes that need to be made to a broad range of commercial services which I do not feel are possible under the current structures.
I would like to set up an iniative, a council of some sort where students can have a say in how the shops and cafes etc run by the Union are operated. It seems that employees of the Union in many cases have more say over the running of services than elected student reps.

Currently the SU President is the Director of Commercial services and I simply do not think this is represented in the way Commercial services operates.

I would like to see this changed so that actual students are more in control of how their Union and the commercial services it provides is run.


The other points are not in my manifesto so I will not comment on them suffice to say that a majority of services here on campus are not funded by the SU anyway but by the University governing body.

The commercial interests were brought in to the college bar (2003/2004ish) because when the SU were running the place it had been running a deficit for the decade previous to that. Is it still making a profit?

To be perfectly honest, and not that anyone cares I personally find Fennelly's campaign the most annoying. I love how she plays up her involvement in societies, neglecting to mention that she's actually the auditor of LifeSoc..A society that's wearing thin with many students.

Lockstep wrote: »

Did anyone go to the hustings?

I went for the first hour or so but then had to leave. Worst hustings I've been to.
The only candidates present were the FEE musketeers and Dami and Tatiana.
The entire business, or what I saw of it, was woeful.
This evening's display would almost drive one to run a RON campaign if one didn't have work to be doing.

Aye, I ken - it appears that five people did that this year.
Probably just as well, as it appeared to be largely a FEE cheerleading exercise.

Very disappointed at hustings last night. I think it was very bad form of the candidates who didn;t bother their arses turning up, it shows a lack of accountability and willingless to engage with the student body.
I also thought that there was a very clear agenda by the vast majority of the people who attended and the whole thing appeared as a bit of a poor attempt at FEE lynch mob.
There was very little engagement and questions that deal with character and policy, especially in the "Presidential debate" which consisted of myself debating with a peice of paper.

Very uncool in my opinion. I was very well prepared for a real engaging debate and was looking forward to comparing policies and manifestos but what it turned into was a glorified lecture shoutout to my campaign team and running mates, some of the SU exec and a large body of my opposition.

Very poor show. While I commend Lit & Deb for hosting the event at such short notice, I feel that the SU could have done a LOT more to promote it and should have.
I also feel that the chair of the "debate" was far from impartial and insisted on asking a number of very loaded questions specifically to FEE candidates which was not on.
He was openly criticised by myself, another member of Lit&Deb and a former auditor of NUI Maynooth Lit&Deb society for this.

I have to say I feel a lot of the event seemed very fishy, especially the very notable lack of candidates who bothered to attend and the incredibly FEE-centric line of questions coming from the right of the house.

I hope people can appreciate that I actually turned up and welcomed and answered questions about myself, the FEE campaign and my policies whereas my opponent and many other candidates did not.

Ficheall wrote: »

3 of the 5 speakers were FEE - so that's hardly unusual...

It is highly improper for a chair of a formal, unbiased debate to act in this manner.

Doctor_Socks wrote: »

I know the current Welfare officer, Brian Grant, spoke quite highly of Curley last year when he was running for Education officer.

Curley ran for President last year.

bildo wrote: »

Very disappointed at hustings last night. I think it was very bad form of the candidates who didn;t bother their arses turning up, it shows a lack of accountability and willingless to engage with the student body.
I also thought that there was a very clear agenda by the vast majority of the people who attended and the whole thing appeared as a bit of a poor attempt at FEE lynch mob.
There was very little engagement and questions that deal with character and policy, especially in the "Presidential debate" which consisted of myself debating with a peice of paper.

That's pretty much the norm for hustings. I dunno if you've been to any before but it's always people who show up with their minds made up and to ask tough questions to other candidates.

bildo wrote: »

Very poor show. While I commend Lit & Deb for hosting the event at such short notice, I feel that the SU could have done a LOT more to promote it and should have.

To be fair, it was well organised at short notice. Normally PDS organise hustings but didn't this year and the event was organised literally the day before the event. With Connolly away on personal business, Grant and Healy running the election committee (combined with their own workloads) and the event organised at the last minute, I don't see much else that could have been done, especially with the college posterboards already saturated with posters for the elections.

bildo wrote: »

I also feel that the chair of the "debate" was far from impartial and insisted on asking a number of very loaded questions specifically to FEE candidates which was not on.

The chair always asks loaded questions, that's their job. That FEE made up the majority of the candidates (including Tatiana who claims to be a member of FEE) means they're well up for more questioning than anyone else.

bildo wrote: »

He was openly criticised by myself, another member of Lit&Deb and a former auditor of NUI Maynooth Lit&Deb society for this.

To be fair, all three members of FEE.

bildo wrote: »

I have to say I feel a lot of the event seemed very fishy, especially the very notable lack of candidates who bothered to attend and the incredibly FEE-centric line of questions coming from the right of the house.

I hope people can appreciate that I actually turned up and welcomed and answered questions about myself, the FEE campaign and my policies whereas my opponent and many other candidates did not.[/QUOTE]
Again, there was a reason for this. Two candidates felt they'd be just heckled and didn't see the point in going only to talk to voters who already had their minds made up. I disagree with this logic but can understand it. Even more understandable is at least 3 other voters who didnt see the point in attending if other candidates were going to be out canvassing, better to hit up voters at the doors instead of 30 or so students who were already supporting candidates.

Hustings mean feck all anyway, otherwise Conor Keane, Conor Kelly/Conor Stitt and Emmet/Joe Loughnane would have sailed into offic laest year.

Fooker wrote: »

Could someone clear something up, did Paul Curley repeat a year? Seems to be a year missing from what I read of his experience I think?

Yup but this shouldn't factor into the job he wants to do. I know people who've failed the year for personal reasons or even ones who just had a tough year academically. I wouldn't vote for someone on this basis (except possible for Education)

IheartGOW wrote: »

I was told by two individuals today that they were verbally assaulted by fee canvassers. Once while canvassing for Kitt, the other was abused after hustings last night. Both times the aggressor was the same. Two guesses for who it was!! complaints are being lodged

To be fair, it's not just FEE. One candidate was standing with a canvasser as I walked past them (in an opposing candidate's tshirt) and the canvasser pretended to spit on me. Stopped to engage with them and was told that those who were born and educated abroad have no excuse for not knowing Irish (which I found borderline xenophobic)
The candidate themself was sound but some canvassers are just dicks. Bring it up with the candidate though, I'm sure they don't want obnoxious bollockses canvassing for them and if they do, it just does them damage.

Made my online vote there... Not going to disclose my votes as regards SU personnel, but as regards the referendum on the ‘No Platform’ policy, I voted not, ridiculous policy. It's a shame the has only been a campaign FOR rather than AGAINST, I haven't seen any posters or canvassers against it anyway...

yer man! wrote: »

Logged onto su website there to vote and apparently i'm not registered, never knew I had to register in advance..... stupid system. Everyone shouls be made vote online anyway.

Aye, you've to call up to the SU to be registered to vote online.
It fits with the rest of the election...

Based on today, my predictions are:

Curley will reach the quota. O'Brien campaigned well but Curley had a machine out.

Stitt will narrowly beat Kitt in 1st preferences, transfers will be up in the air making this a tight race. Kitt had a strong canvassing team out but some seemed shy about approaching people. Stitt seemed to concentrate far more on shout-outs than Kitt.

Dami will perform well in welfare and will be elected without reaching the quota.