Elections 2013 Overview

Friday night’s elections results event at the Cube culminated a long two weeks of campaigning, facebook spam and watching candidates embarrass themselves in awkward videos and lecture shout outs.

But now it’s all over (phew), and a whole new team have been elected to rule the students of Southampton, and believe it or not, these guys will have an impact on your time at uni here. So, here’s a quick recap of the final results.

Having been referenced all over SUSUtv, our polls were pretty much spot on, even predicting the order of the candidates for most of the positions. Yes, they weren’t 100% right, but they were very close and we scored 6/7 with our predictions.

VP Student Communities: We said Oli, and the voters agreed. The race between Oli and James (after Jess Taylor withdrew last week), was extremely close, with only 76 votes between them. We thought Oli would storm ahead but James put up a very strong campaign, leaving Oli to take a lead by only 2%!

VP Education: The polls were tight, with only 1 or 2% between David and Dessie but we said DMW would win this. Dessie put up a strong fight but in the end it went to David.

VP Democracy and Creative Industries: This was the poll’s most accurate prediction, David was pipped to win with Jon not too close behind.

VP Engagement: We said Claire, our polls said Claire and the voters too said Claire. A close race between Fiona and Adam ensued but Claire took the lead. Another prediction correct.

VP Welfare: This result surprised everyone! Our polls and predictions genuinely thought Josie was going to have this one in the bag, closely followed by Sophie. Josie seemed to have a presence on campus everywhere but in the end it went to Beckie after the transfers from RON and Josh.

VP Sports Development: Our reader polls and predictions were bang on. This result could’ve gone either way, and to any of the candidates. Alex’s brilliant (and probably the best of the whole elections) video would’ve drummed up some votes but his and Sam’s votes were eventually transferred for Evan to win, closely followed by Kate.

President: Easily one of the most predictable races in these elections, a showdown between Gilani and PeeWee. Joke candidates, Jim and Dando, both beat RON but their votes were transferred, followed by Sophie’s and Ellis’. Excluding Jim, our polls said David, the facebook likes said David and true to form, the Gilani-Army saw a victory, closely followed by PeeWee.

The all new Sabbatical team comprises of three Davids, all elected in on St David’s Day! Beckie and Evan are both current second years which is a great result for creating a Sabb team in-touch with students. They’ll take a year out between 2nd and 3rd year to be a Sabb, then return to finish their degrees after.

This year’s elections combined the Sabbs, Student Leader, Union Councillor and Trustee roles all into one election in an effort to promote the student leader roles. In some instances there were over 1000 votes for some SL positions and Union Councillors. Joining all of these elections will no doubt have raised the awareness of the more obscure student volunteer positions and has brought some fresh faces into the leadership of SUSU.

Not every student leader position was filled and there’ll be a by-election next term, perhaps some of the unlucky candidates may fancy their chances in another position, or even you could run for one.

Some statistics for you:

• 6046 students voted
• 27.5% turnout
• 74 candidates
• 64 hours of voting
• 41 Soton Tab articles
• and 170,142 hits

From all of us at the Soton Tab, thanks for reading. And just remember, if there’s something you think needs changing, something you’re not happy about or something that could do with some praise; then don’t limit yourself to our comments section – leave your keyboard alone and go and do something about it!