First ever NUS delegate hustings take place at Warwick

Warwick’s first ever National Union of Students (NUS) delegate hustings took place in the SU Atrium last Monday October 16.

The six elected delegates are now expected to attend the NUS National Conference next March.

Last year, the delegates from the University were Alexandra Bevis, Chairman Rose, Chloe Wynne, Dapo Adaremewa, Hope Worsdale and Uma Kotwal.

Out of the six delegates chosen by Warwick students, three must be self-defining women in order to comply with NUS requirements of a gender balanced committee. This year, five of the sixteen candidates are female.

It is the first time that the Warwick SU has held hustings for NUS candidates, due to last year’s motion on changing the way the system runs. The motion, “Greater Say for Students at Warwick on the Leadership of NUS”, was passed in last year’s SU Referenda in Term 3.

It resolved to organise annual hustings for the candidates wishing to become NUS delegates. As well as that, it planned to hold an additional online vote to see who Warwick students would like to vote for as Officers in the NUS Annual Conference.

Elected delegates must respect the mandate and vote according to their peers’ choices unless they explicitly say they will not honour the motion.

The NUS Annual Conference was also moved from June to March, therefore the hustings had to take place during the Autumn elections, not the Spring elections as they had previously done.

It was great to see our NUS delegate candidates being able to speak about why they are running for the role and the causes they are passionate about.
Michael Kynaston, DDO

Out of the sixteen candidates that have nominated themselves on the SU website, only eight went to the hustings. These were Juvan Gowreeswaran, Ky Hall, Rhal Ssan, Thomas Soud, Mohammed Abraar, Helena Naverette Plana, Nathan Lavenstein and Alex Delamelleiure.

Those who were not present were Charlotte Bourne, Ryan Girard, Henry Naylor, Calum Paton, Woody Phillips-Smith, Chairman Rose, Ale Ruvinsky and Julie Saumagne.

After their respective two minute introductory speeches, each candidate was asked to answer three questions.

The first question addressed the mandate to vote for NUS Officer in accordance to Warwick students’ opinions and if the candidates would honour such motion. Mohammed, Juvan, Nathan, Rhal and Alex agreed to accept the motion regardless of their personal beliefs while Ky, Helena and Thomas said it clashed with their principles.

After discussing their policy points, the candidates were asked how they would improve student engagement in the NUS. In this portion of the debate, candidates brought up the fact that the NUS is sometimes ridiculed and that Warwick SU even held a referenda in 2016 to disaffiliate with the organisation.

The overall consensus from candidates was to make NUS policies more visible within campus. After this, there were no questions from the floor.

Michael Kynaston, Democracy and Development Officer, was pleased with the way the hustings took place. He said: “It was great to see our NUS delegate candidates being able to speak about why they are running for the role and the causes they are passionate about.”

The polls opened at 9am on Tuesday October 17 and will close on Thursday. The provisional results will be published at midday on Friday.