thewaterfrontYOUR UNIVERSITY, YOUR EXPERIENCE, YOUR VOICE, YOUR PAPER

12 March 2010 - Issue 189www.waterfrontonline.co.uk EST - 1995

FORTNIGHTLY AND FREE

2010 ELECTION SPECIALReturn of the Famous Five- Five SABBS Returned to office- Luke James scrapes into Education

By Alun Rhys Chivers and Collette BirdElection Editors

AT THE stroke of 3am, Swansea students’ re-election of President Luke Young was announced to an expectant crowd at Diva’s.With 1,866 votes registered, Young amassed 1,224 of them. A visibly shaken Paul Cargeeg claimed a mere 503. Young said, “I never take any election for granted. Paul put up a strong campaign with more than double the number of great campaigners on his team, so I didn’t expect tonight’s result. But I’m

happy with it – it’s been a good week!“I knew that Paul was an executive committee member, who was passionate about the union and had an idea about what he would do with the job and I was more than happy to have that battle of idea and the debate that went on throughout the campaign.”Although widely expected to reclaim his position for another year, few people would have expected such a wide margin of victory, least of all Young himself. “I’m surprised because my votes are higher. I honestly expected to have less votes as the core of third years who voted for me last year has left. But it’s nice, as

it gives me the confidence to realise that what I’ve been doing over the past year has struck a chord with those who turned up to vote. I must be doing something right!”Unity was duly maintained, with Young’s colleagues returned to their respective positions. Although pleased with his own success, Young expressed his disappointment that he will not be working alongside his campaign manager from last year, Simon Darvill. “In truth, I think the worry was more over Education than President, because I felt Simon Darvill would make a fantastic Education Officer. Sadly, that

won’t be the case but that’s something we accept. “I still fully look forward to working with Luke James next year. He’s passionate about what he does and he has some great ideas for the Education portfolio.“During election week you can never tell what’s going to happen. You’re always in that bubble. But ultimately, students have had their say and I respect whatever team they have put together for next year.”Unlike newcomer Luke James, Young will be back at his desk less than ten hours after winning a mandate for a

second term. “I’ve got over a thousand emails in my inbox. I’ll be dealing with them and starting on my manifestos.”Spare a thought, then, for an emotional Paul Cargeeg, who told The Waterfront earlier in the evening that should he be defeated, he would continue to work on his Masters degree in Environmental Dynamics and Climatic Change.“Needless to say, I feel awful. But I wish Luke Young all the best in his second year in office. I’m still really glad I campaigned. It was a blast and I don’t regret a thing.”

By Laura Richards and Angharad WilliamsElection Reporters

WITH EIGHT candidates in the running for Educational Officer, it was always going to be close but no-one could have predicted the final result.Going the full eight rounds, it was finally Luke James that triumphed over Simon Darvill in a shock seventy vote swing in the final round.

Tensions increased as it took three and a half hours of counting before the final result was announced. When asked what the atmosphere was like whilst the counting was taking place, Luke revealed “it was everything you would expect and indeed want from an election. There were tears, people shaking, myself included, and people pacing. It was a completely unreal situation.”

With Simon Darvill leading until the final round it looked likely that he would take the position. However due to the voting system it was Luke who took the lead at the final hurdle. He later commented, “I knew there was going to be a lot of votes but I thought there would have been a pretty even split. However to win is just the best feeling in the world. The whole election was crazy and coming up against a friend, was a ridiculous situation.”

Continued page 3PASSIONATE CELEBRATIONS: Students wait until the early hours in Divas to hear election results

02 ELECTIONS WATERFRONT 189 - 12/03/10

By James TaylorElection Reporter

WITH ONLY the faceless candidate RON to go up against, International Officer Andy Patton retained his position amongst as International Officer. Catching up with Mr. Patton we asked him how he felt about winning, “Super, it’s really good to start at something and be given the opportunity by the students to continue as I like to think to good parts of my work that the Student Unions have produced.”When questioned about how he felt running unopposed he told The Waterfront “It was mixed emotions to be totally honest. When I found out in Xtreme Lounge, I was over the moon to be totally honest. Then when it came to the campaigning, to try and convince people and make sure that they came and voted when they said ‘you’re the only candidate’. I felt not only could the voters become complacent but I wondered if the campaign itself would become complacent.”Currently the International Officer has put in full effort to learn his native language Gaelic, as well as Spanish,

Italian, French, German, Polish, Portuguese, Arabic and now Mandarin – the most spoken language amongst international students. When asked how the lessons were going Patton replied with “Its going well, it’s going slower than I thought to be totally honest. As a language graduate myself I am used to strict conversation classes, written classes, oral classes, whereas this is really sort of language basics”. However Andy let us in on a little exclusive about the future Mrs. Patton by stating “[I am also trying to] improve my Slovak so I can speak to the maybe future wife’s parents a bit better”. When questioned about this proposal, Andy lovingly replied “ a proposal has been on the cards for a while; I frequently mention that she is the love of my life and she knows, if your reading Nina Olenočinova, there is definitely a massive future on the cards there, and I just hope everything goes well”In regards to future policies Andy was more than happy to tell us about his upcoming plans “On the manifesto I proposed to bring a Western Union onto campus to ease finance and difficulties for the international students.” Also having been victim to theft during the Team Sloth T.I.T.S FC Final, Andy Patton states that a Western Union would help such a situation if such a situation occurs for any of the international students. He goes on to state that “Other than that I would like to see Eid back in Fulton house dining room. Also getting Islamic prayer on the Xtreme Radio Station, and just waiting on the funding coming from the Saudi source.”

Luck of the Irish returns unopposed Patton

NUMEROUS people have told me that the candidate running for re-election will always win, and in Raechel Mattey’s case, it’s no different. In a landslide win against opponent Craig Lawton, Mattey has retained her position as Societies and Services Officer, with a winning margin of over 600 votes. “It feels really good. Obviously I’m passionate about the work I do and now I get to have another go next year and really improve on things.” Raechel struggled through a tiring campaign, saying it was tough due to many friends having too much work to help out, but with a throng of supporters,

team Mattey came through. When asked if she expected to win, she replied “I was quietly confident; I think I’ve worked very hard this week and I was very visual, but I wasn’t overly confident and didn’t take much notice of the exit polls, I was just hoping!” Raechel has numerous goals that she hopes to achieve in the coming year, including the introduction of a hand-over pack for societies and a commercial services review covering hours of operation and amenities available to students. Raechel’s response to Luke James’ winning of the highly contested position of Education Officer was “I’m really happy for Luke, don’t get me wrong, but Simon Darvill has been so

supportive of loads of SU campaigns and he has been since his first day in the SU. He’s been a personal supporter of both my campaigns and he’ll be greatly missed next year. However, congratulations to Luke.” When asked about the result, runner-up Craig Lawton commented “I don’t know what to make of it really. I knew when I saw the [ballot] papers that I hadn’t won; it was just a case of hanging on. I really enjoyed going round talking to people, and I wouldn’t have done it if I hadn’t enjoyed it.” So congratulations to Raechel on another triumphant campaign, and good luck on what hopefully promises to be another successful year.

Mattey manages re-election for societies and services

By Charlie TeasdaleElection Reporter

By Tom HainesElection Reporter

Raegan retains Women’s position in tight election

they looked identical, we were both very scared. So I was very relieved when the result was called.” Healy was also quick to praise her opponent saying both before the result was called and afterwards that Rampling had done such a great job that she’d had to work ten times harder than last year.

Healy told us she starts work again tomorrow at 9am and hopes to continue with her existing priorities and begin working on her manifesto pledges. Earlier in the evening she told us some of what she hopes to achieve next year, “I’ve done a lot of campaigns and events this year, but I think that training and development of women’s careers is something I want to work on but because I’ve been so busy with other campaigns I’ve not had the chance so that’s something I really want to work on.”

Healy admitted that her campaign team will make sure tonight is a “messy one” in celebration of the result. She said that her campaign team deserve a

special mention as they have kept her going throughout the week and put all their efforts into her re-election.

For our full interview with Raegan Healy, log on to the SAAB Election section of Waterfront Online.

INCUMBENT Women’s Officer, Raegan Healy has retained her position in a tight fought election against Sarah Rampling. Healy won the election with 56% of the vote whilst her opponent took 41%, her majority over Rampling was 270 votes. This was a much tougher fought contest than Healy’s victory last year where her majority was 453 in an election which was fought against two other candidates.

After a fairly relaxed and according to the candidates “enjoyable” day of campaigning, the pressure began to show. The emotion visibly got to Rampling whilst Healy was visibly nervous as we spoke to her a couple of hours after the polls closed. Exit polls suggested Healy had a lead of 58.4% to 32.1%, but she refused to be drawn on them saying “I don’t want to hear the exit poll results. I know a few years back somebody was so far ahead on the exit polls but didn’t win, so I don’t think they’re always a good judge of the results. That’s why I don’t want to hear them.”

Healy admitted that as she and her opponent were waiting for the vote to be called she didn’t know what to think, she said “It was so close. We were both looking at the piles (of voting slips) and HARASSED: Campaigns out in force

Cartoon by Martin Maxwell

www.waterfront.co.uk Election 03

Continued from Front page

Clearly disappointed, Simon Darvill told The Waterfront “we tried so hard, we had an amazing team and there’s absolutely nothing I would have changed”.

Also facing a let down this election evening, Kyle Soulsby congratulates the newly elected Education Officer “We all had a great campaign team, so well done to Luke – he did it!.” Kyle said “I’m gutted, really gutted, it would have been great to have a victory, but we tried our best. You win some you lose some”.

Despite the past week’s efforts all seven candidates left exhausted and disappointed after a long day of campaigning on campus, while Luke James maintained the suggested exit polls and secured his place as Education Officer for the forthcoming year.

LANCE Horsey jumped the final furlong to win a second term as Welfare Officer, beating his nearest opponent Charlotte Britton in the final round of voting by 136. Upon hearing the result he declared himself both “relieved and happy.”

When asked whether he expected the result following his success last year, he said: “I wouldn’t say that I expected it, but I was quite optimistic,

but not fully confident in any way.”The main policy on his manifesto

is the development of a pharmacy on campus and Lance sees this as a crucial policy for students.

“The pharmacy on campus is the big push now. There will be other campaigns throughout the year but this is what we will be lobbying for the most because I really do believe that a pharmacy on campus should be a right not a privilege.”

All of the campaign teams of the candidates have played their part over the last couple of weeks and Lance was

quick to praise their efforts.“I would like to say thank you very

much. We didn’t have a big team this year but they all worked extremely hard, got their heads down and worked their socks off.”

Following his re-election, the immediate question was how it differed from last year.

“There was no real comparison in terms of my campaign but last year ran I ran against six others which was difficult.”

With a great deal of support from friends, Lance was able to secure his

second term and spoke of his campaign in general.

“It’s gone well and I had great amount of help from a lot of people and I’m extremely grateful for that” he said.

He also saw off competition from Ben Shaw and James Kerr and following this Horsey offered words of support to his fellow candidates.

“Hopefully they will go on to bigger and better things and I wish them all the best.”

By Ben Donovan Election Reporter

Snapshot election we

ofek

Photographs by Tim Bird and Silvia Gremlichaun Mandler

www.waterfront.co.uk News 07

Lleu WilliamsNUS Deputy President

WHAT A NIGHT! I am only still awake because I have been doing this for around four years now I think - ask Ross Gilman, he’s the one going grey! But as I said, what a night; a night full of emotion, a night full of nerves and more importantly a night full of results!I spent most of the evening flying between Divas (if you call it DV8 you deserve to be kicked out of Swansea University!) and the count room, as I was called upon to translate. What the Union will do without my fantastic bilingual skills in the future, I am not quite sure!

But to get down to business, the count room was full of nervous candidates, all anxious to see whether they were successful in their quests for sabbatical positions or not. Having been in that position myself, I have to say it was one of the most nerve racking and horrible experiences of my life, and any candidate I am sure will agree with me. In addition to this, emotions can run high with so many campaign teams having spent their entire week working hard for their candidate, and, yes, there will be (and there have been) some tears, but this is only natural. From what I have seen, it’s fantastic to see so many campaign teams enthused and engaging within the election process, and this in turn rubs off on students, which with an 1800-1900 turnout is amazing!

But when a candidate loses, yes people will cry. What I would say to the people who were unlucky in their elections is to be proud of what you have achieved. It isn’t easy to stand for election, let alone spend all week talking to students and engaging them in the process. You have all worked hard, and you all deserve a pat on the back for what is an emotionally and physically draining week. I remember when I lost, my campaign team were in bits, but I was the most grateful person to them all, and I am sure that all candidates will be the same with their teams.

But to see so many candidates running, in what I saw as a well fought election, was fantastic from an NUS Wales point of view. From what I could see, there were so many talented candidates running, and it was great to see candidates taking on incumbent candidates, which isn’t an easy thing to do! Trust me, I had to make that decision myself, and I know it’s not an easy one!

To finish, I would say that this election will live within my memory, a veteran of five elections myself as campaigner, candidate and observer. Well done to everyone who took part, it’s an experience you will never forget. To quote one of my favourite people when I lost my election two years ago, “everything happens for a reason”, I didn’t believe it at the time, but trust me, it really does.

NUS Overview

By Kimberly De SelincourtElection Reporter

AFTER WEEKS of campaigning and a long night of walkouts, tension and tears – it was clear that the pressure of karaoke had gotten to everyone. Okay, so clearly elections were top of the agenda, but anyone who needed a little

light relief found it in the welcoming arm of the night long, drunken musical entertainment.

All the candidates put up a good fight, with Team Paul leaving Divas throwing shapes to Bohemian Rhapsody and Charlotte Britton’s crew representing with a stellar rendition of Busted – Thunderbirds are Go. Lance Horsey put in a massive effort with

three performances, the best of which, and possibly a contender for best performance of the night, coming in the form of Mambo Number 5, complete with beautifully choreographed dance routine.

But with the grandeur of the nights consequences setting in for the candidates something big was needed. Ben Kennedy told The Waterfront “There’s been a lot

of stress this evening and I think people have enjoyed themselves because of the karaoke”. Already overplayed, and no more so than tonight (with three plays and counting), Journey’s Don’t Stop Believing became the victory song. To quote newly elected Education Officer Luke James, “We literally never stopped believing”. The song is golden. Enough said.

Real tension of the night! Battle for Kings of Karaoke

By Sophie EvansElection Reporter

The counting room has a whole different feel to the outside world. Inside, it is silent, tense and focused. Inside is exclusive. Being an insider, in my element at the centre of the action, it was strange to know that the gossip wouldn’t make it up to the office for a good while yet.

Watching the candidates, their faces were deadly serious, especially the two still in the running for Education Officer, who had been there for three hours at that point. Nerve-filled Luke James, favourite according to the exit polls, was glued to his seat, head in hands, whilst his competitor stood against the wall looking highly emotional. All candidates were visibly anxious, stressed and on edge, looking to the centre of the room where the counting tables were located.

As apprehensive as they were, I felt excited. Although by now it was 1am, time flew by and I was desperate to be there when an announcement was made,

dying to see the reactions and tears. As they prepared to announce Education Officer, I got my wish. Everyone crowded around Luke and Simon, both terrified. As I stood up to get a better look, even my heart skipped a beat. Once the result was revealed, both boys smiled as they came together. Then after briefly breaking down, Luke celebrated, overjoyed, whilst Simon left gracefully with his head held high, but another candidate left in floods of tears.

Having waited for the main result of the night, it was time for me to go after a brief chat with SU General Manager, Stuart Rice, about the counters themselves who were said to be “excited about the results, especially when the votes were close”. As I left, the Welfare candidates did not yet seem overly uneasy. ‘Not for long’ were my thoughts on the matter, having witnessed at first hand what they were about to go through!

Behind the scenes at the election count

By David LewisNews Reporter and Xtreme News Editor

Sitting here eagerly awaiting the next result, I observe a hive of journalistic activity; Tweets being updated, articles being written and edited, interviews conducted and more than a few yawns, indicative of the lengthy waiting game experienced by all of us awaiting the results of the 2010 SU election.

Indeed, Xtreme Radio certainly enjoyed another busy and anxious sabbatical election results night, including a live show running throughout the evening and into the early hours of the morning. The baking Xtreme studio played host to the broadcast, which included the on-air release of the exit polls conducted by Xtreme and The Waterfront during the course of the two days’ voting.

There was also much discussion about the roles of the sabbatical officers in union life, announcement of results as they were released and interviews with the winners and some of the runners-up. Although, there were many election broadcast regulations by which to abide, a great time was had by all who were involved in the annual long-haul show, and feedback from the listenership was positive.

It is amazing to observe how involved one can become, even as a journalist, broadcaster and writer, when the results are being announced and one can only feel for the candidate who emerges as the runner-up. The Education Officer vote certainly got to us all in the studio, nails being actually bitten when it came down to 7th preferences.

Another election broadcast and another year complete. The countdown now begins to see who will run and fill the six hot seats in twelve months’ time.

Election lowdown from the

Media Centre