“Is that loud enough for you, arsehole?” This was an apt way for the notoriously cantankerous rock icon to open what was to become his final gig. Yet Lou was far from this image in his performance tonight. Though noticeably fragile looking in a vest (in stark contrast to the gold chain around his neck) in the somewhat stark setting of London’s Royal Festival hall, Lou didn’t fail to deliver an unforgettable performance, relatively free from his trademark moodswings.
Though his recent illness did lead to some reduction in his vocal range and set length (the show was reduced to a mere thirteen songs), his re-workings of his now-legendary Velvet Underground material sounded remarkably fresh, even next to his new offerings from 2011’s collaboration with Metallica, Lulu. Retrospectively, the omnipresent sadness that ran through the bulk of Reed’s work seems to permeate even more in this swansong gig- though the hits were ever present including the crowd pleasing “I’m Waiting for My Man”, “Walk On The Wildside” and “Heroin” to name a few. Also notable was the inclusion of the more obscure “Cremation” from 1992’s Magic and Loss, in which Lou delivered an emotive reflection on his own mortality (“When I leave this joint/ at some further point/ the same coal black sea will be waiting”). I have always been struck by Reed’s ability to create reactive, subversive songs (one need only look at his blatant references to transvestites and oral sex) that are nonetheless deeply emotional outpourings.
On this particular night, this dichotomy was epitomised in the closing track of the main set, “Junior Dad”. From Lulu, a project universally slammed by critics, this song truly goes against this superficial opinion in its deep haunting beauty. Reed’s dramatic monologue-style delivery and beautiful diction was truly tear-jerking, as he frankly reflects on the failure of a father modelled after his own, singing “Sunny, A monkey then to Monkey,/ I will teach you meanness, fear and blindness/ No social redeeming kindness/ or- no state of grace”. Some members of the seated audience seemed to miss the profundity of this song and laugh at the end of this track, but Lou’s stern expression cast out from the stage as the lights faded showed the harsh reality of his lyrics.
Though the encore comprised of the amphetamine-fuelled “White Light/ White Heat”, in which all swarmed down from the seats to the foot of the stage in an attempt to dance like back to the days of Warhol’s factory, for hard-core Reeders then “Junior Dad” was the apt close to the night. To use Lou’s own frank words to sum up the end of fifty years of performance, “Hiccup, the dream is over/ Get the coffee, turn the lights on”. It is true that the world has lost one of its most influential and greatest performers, but Lou would be the first to advocate we move on and try and to find the next rock and roll star.
The Old Quad of Brasenose is a fairly odd place to be in this week. On either side of it this OUSU election’s two most interesting campaigns can be found.
Jane4Change, the centre-left establishment slate, have set up an improvised headquarters at the top of one staircase in the spacious room of James Blythe, who’s running for a sabbatical position.
It feels like what you imagine the hub of a student political campaign would be like: there are kettles, empty crisp packets and leaflets strewn across the floor. Anxious candidates can be found tapping away on their mobiles, coordinating two dozen or so supporters who are busily knocking on doors and distributing campaign literature.
In a room at the bottom of another Brasenose staircase sits Louis Trup, the famous ‘joke candidate’ for OUSU President. He wears shorts, sandals and psychedelic Himalayan knitwear. His campaign employs no leaflets, laptops or spreadsheets – just smartphones. There is no knocking on doors. Trup doesn’t need to; his message, which oscillates between crazy and sensible, has effortlessly been pushed onto our facebook and twitter feeds.
On the one hand you have an efficient and organised campaign that’s been whirring away since Trinity term. On the other you have a third-year geographer (and his mates) who saw an opportunity a couple of weeks ago to stir things up. It is the latter strategy, if you use the admittedly simplistic measure of facebook likes, that bizarrely seems to be working: Jane4Change – 479; LJTrup4ousu4change – 538.
So, is this a case of the old-style OUSU machine politics breaking down against online and social-media based campaigning?
Sort of. To be fair to the Jane4Change campaign they’ve put a lot of effort into social media and promoting their candidates online. Before they had to abandon a suspiciously excellent website the slate had a far better online offering than Alex Bartram’s Team Alex or Nathan Akehurst’s ReclaimOUSU. But what the campaign has failed to understand about social media is that, used best, it shouldn’t simply be a medium through to hurl out set-piece candidate pitches and unexciting blog posts. It should distribute content that normal people participate in and consequently want to share.
If Louis Trup emerges victorious on Thursday evening (unlikely, but plausible) it’ll be because his campaign did understand that fact. It produced a campaign video that wasn’t just 4 minutes of excellent procrastination but, through inviting (coercing?) other students to join in made it instantly shareable. At hustings he sung songs, varying the lyrics between colleges to match their distinct quirks. It hasn’t hurt either that his campaign’s status updates have been witty and hilarious – two features not commonly associated with student politics.
In fact Trup has benefitted from old-fashioned advantages too. First, he’s something of a socialite with a wide circle of friends at various colleges. Second, he’s had plenty of uncritical coverage from student media, though the coverage in these pastures has thankfully been more even-handed. And third, his message is compelling – ridiculous and possibly dangerous, sure – but compelling nonetheless.
Of course facebook likes and retweets aren’t votes. One Jane4Change campaigner told me today that the people enthused by Louis Trup online won’t, by and large, end up voting. Maybe he’s right.
The worry for Jane Cahill – and indeed Bartram and Akehurst as well – is that colourful candidates like Trup break the effectiveness of her team’s enthusiastic slating. Students may well log on and vote in support of their local OUSU hack, say. What they have less of a reason to do is to follow through on their friend’s recommendation to vote Cahill, Bartram or Akehurst. Behind the security of a computer screen, and with the vague mental image of a funny sandal-clad loon, the temptation is to fuck it and vote Trup.
00.46: After a rollercoaster few days, the ride is finally over.
We’ve covered as much of this election as possible. We’ve been accused of ‘rimming OUSU’. But we never saw this result coming.
It remains to be seen what Louis will do with the Presidency, if he chooses to accept it, but it’s an historic year to be a member of OUSU and we’re very glad to have been part of it.
To quote the Health and Safety Act: Back injuries are the greatest single cause of absenteeism from the workplace, often caused by manual handling activities, eg the lifting and carrying of loads.
Be careful, guys.
00.05: Here’s our video of the moment that Louis J Trup discovered that he had won the OUSU Presidency, captured live in Brasenose bar.
23.30: Here are a lot of tweets. Oxford seems to be divided into the jubilant and the bemused, but, for once, everyone’s talking about OUSU.
Ashamed to be an Oxford student tonight. #ousu2013
23.10: Everyone is having their say on the result of the election and we’ll try and make a post of the most interesting thoughts. While we’re waiting, here’s a song that goes out to all the Labour backed candidates, who performed about as well as a Katy Perry acoustic set (*burn*).
22.40: Apologies for the downtime, Oxford’s two biggest news sources both experienced huge demand and our servers couldn’t handle it.
For those who have been living in a vacuum or St Hugh’s:
LOUIS J TRUP IS OUR NEW OUSU
PRESIDENT-ELECT!
21.01: Results:
President
Alex Bartram: 725
Jane Cahill: 975
LJ Trup: 1,685
Nathan Akehurst: 587
VP Access and Academic Affairs
James Blythe: 976
Rob Collins: 589
VP Charities and Communities
Angie Normandale: 560
Ruth Meredith: 1213
VP Graduates
Nick Dickinson: 114
Yasser Bhatti: 231
VP Welfare and Equal Opportunities
Andrew Rogers: 716
Chris Pike: 816
VP for Women
Anna Bradshaw: 576
Trish Stephenson: 260
20.50: Jack Matthews, fallen angel of OUSU, estimates the results will come through at about 9pm. Here are some more tweets in the meantime:
The Presidents of Teddy Hall, Jesus and Brasenose squeeze together for an embarassing selfie.
20.24: News on Oxide suggests that the count will be delayed by approximately 5 minutes. Could that be due to a recount if the vote has been tight?
We’ll be posting the results of all the elections here on the live blog as soon as possible, so if you can’t tune in to Oxide then you’ll be able to get a proper breakdown here!
20.18: A tweet from inside the Jane4Chang(e) HQ in Queen’s shows a cardboard cut-out of someone who might be The King, or might be Elvis…
20.06: You can currently hear Tom Rutland and a couple of chaps from the OxStu (who desperately need to get closer to the microphones) on Oxide, before the results are announced at 20:30pm.
18.24: News from Camp Jange and the mood seems pretty positive, a message from Jane4Change agent Will Brown says:
‘Regardless of the result, proud of the campaign we’ve run, and having had the courage to make the argument for a building. After three long days of doorknocking, I’m too tired to say anything more articulate, and am just looking forward to a drink or two.’
18.15: Is Nathan Akehurst admitting defeat by posting this daring photo on the Reclaim OUSU Facebook page? We’ll find out at 20:30pm!
17.32: A bold idea has emerged on Twitter, courtesy of Maeve Scullion (who is also the originator of the Cherwell ‘rimming OUSU’ mantra that we live our lives by).
Idea: maybe the college with lowest participation rate in #ousu2013 election should be denied subsidised condoms for a year. #vote4johnnies
17.26: Confusingly, a number of people seem to have just received emails informing them that there are only 6 hours left to vote. The reality is that there’s a mere 34 minutes remaining.
Hopefully this won’t cause people to delay submitting their votes.
17.09: Our man-on-the-ground Max Long is back with this report from the High Street.
If you want to get in touch with your thoughts, reflections, ambitions, credit card numbers, analysis or confessions, tweet us @Cherwell_Online or #cherwellelection or email editor[@]cherwell.org!
17.06: One hour to go (or 54 minutes cos I was busy drinking a Fanta)!
16.14: If you were worried that we’re not taking our print day seriously, and prepping a wonderfully OUSU filled issue for you, then this Vine ought to allay your fears.
15.22: We’ve just had word from Jane4Change’s lead agent Helena Dollimore that VP Access and Academic Affairs candidate James Blythe has suffered a serious ankle injury on the campaing trail.
Could this open the door for the enigmatic Rob Collins?
13.39: In our video debate this week Nathan Akehurst declared that, if he fails to secure the OUSU Presidency, he’s planning to “publish [his] first novel”. Here is an exclusive extract* from Akehurst’s debut novel, Partage: A Portrait.
…the voice at the end of the line was tainted by the faint whirr of privatised mobile phone services, to the point where Nathan could hardly hear him. He strained to listen closer: Would this reveal where the dead body was? Where had the caller stashed the rotting corpse of Capitalism? He had already searched far and wide, but his work had been stifled by his idiotic bosses Detective Carhil and DSI Batrom. Still, if his hunch was correct, this phonecall could lead him to the body and to sufficient DNA evidence to convict that most demonic of criminals, Lewis Troop. All he had to do was listen. Damn it, Nathan thinks, if only I could shake this goddam sinus cold…
*artist’s impression of a potential, albeit non-existant, exclusive extract.
13.18: Another video release from Oxford’s super-hack Louis J Trup.
Trup, a former Access Officer at the Oxford Union, has rapidly moved into the position of the bookie’s favourite.
13.00: Race to the online polling station to cash in your hard-won vote, time’s running out!
12.10: It may seem like there’s something of a liberation going on in Oxford today, but Louis J Trup, we can reveal, was there in 1969 with Jimi Hendrix for the real liberation.
11.37: With little over six hours of polling remaining, we’ve had a chat with current OUSU Supremo Tom Rutland, who offered us the following nugget:
“OUSU is no stranger to close elections, with one candidate for a VP position winning by around 10 votes 3 years ago, and 2 years ago the Presidential race was decided by 80 votes. With just over 6 hours of polling remaining, it’s all going down to the wire…”
DJT’s victory over David Railton two years ago certainly seems the closest mirror to this year’s election, given that it was a five-way split with a joke candidate. But who will play the role of our favourite mutton-chopped Aussie in this year’s race?
Time will tell…
11.22: Time for an update from our election analyst, the mysterious Carlos Tejon.
Spending in excess of £4 on cheese, including brie and camembert, does this show that Akehurst is out of touch with the average student?
Have your say by tweeting @Cherwell_Online or #cherwellelection, or emailing editor[@]cherwell.org!
09.50: It’s a beautiful morning in Oxford. The grey clouds have given way to sparkly blue skies and vigorous sunshine. And, in the midst of this, one man looms sunnier than the rest…
09.44: Last night saw the news that Returning Officer Nick Cooper had joined the candidates of this gaffe-filled election by blundering with the nomination of Lauren McKarus, a visiting student.
McKarus told Cherwell: “I refused to withdraw my candidacy because I did not believe that I would be honouring the very reasons for which I ran if I backed down for not being considered a “real student” of Oxford and did not stand by my manifesto in that I want to represent ALL international students.”
21/11, 09.38: Welcome to the final day of Cherwell’s coverage of the 2013 OUSU election. In the words of Jean-Claude Van Damme, we have a most epic of splits…
23.15: A final message from VP Charities and Communities candidate Ruth Meredith, before we turn in for bed.
Ruth was seen to be wearing a yellow scarf, which suggests she may be suffering from serious liver failure.
Check back in tomorrow for more updates from the final day of the election, and be sure to contact us on Twitter @Cherwell_Online or #cherwellelection!
19.41: An exclusive image from inside the den of back-stabbing and double-dealing that is PresCom. Magdalen President Millie Ross and Wadham President Anya Metzer are the embodiment of the selfie zeitgeist here.
If you’d like your selfie featured on the live blog in an inexplicably ornate frame, tweet it to @Cherwell_Online!
19.32: Breaking news from St Anne’s as a Reclaim OUSU poster is defaced to produce a slightly different message. Unconfirmed reports suggest this may be an eleventh hour change of direction for the campaign.
17.45: News of this tense and unsettling election (not to mention live blog) appears to have spread far beyond Oxford. The BBC is currently running the unlikely tale of LJ Trup as its top story!
16.28: In the first of – let’s hope – many election polls, we took to the streets to ask OUSU voters who they have, or will be, voting for. The results seem to suggest that we’re still an indecisive bunch, and put Cahill and Trup pretty much neck-and-neck.
16.08: Our man-on-the-ground Max Long has reported back with a series of Vines about the mood around Oxford.
15.53: We’ve put together a little graph of the various Presidential candidates and their respective Facebook likes. Obviously, those numbers will be constantly changing over the next few hours but were correct at the point of graph-making.
15.07: Conspiracy theorists here at Cherwell HQ have uncovered an amazing moment during Cherwell’s OUSU Presidential debate. At 6:54, YouTube’s automatically captioning service exposes the real Nathan Akehurst.
14.32: The OxStu editors have come out and backed Nathan Akehurst: a bold move as it looks increasingly like he’s going to come last. But their deputy comment editor is obviously a popular figure up there in OUSU towers. You can read their endorsement here.
Who are you backing? Tweet @Cherwell_Online or #cherwellelection, or email us at editor[@]cherwell.org!
14.12: Dark horse joke/serious candidate Louis J Trup has released another video, this time seeing him reenact a scene from hit movie Braveheart. The political satire of this message is between 20 and 700 years old, depending on whether you’re a cinephile or a Gaelic freedom fighter.
13.01: Following yesterday’s Jane4Chang furore (which was totally not just a typo and entirely our fault…), a grainy photo has emerged showing Cahill with embattled meth-loving Toronto mayor Rob Ford.
12.21: Our man-on-the-ground Max Long has reported back from what appears to be his own bedroom.
Max will be Vining his way across Oxford today, so try and get in front of his camera lens and grab your 6 seconds of fame.
12.00: If you think it’s all gone a bit quiet here at Cherwell Towers in terms of extended pieces of commentary on the election, then you’d be pleasantly mistaken. Former editor (and general Brasenose BNOC) Tom Beardsworth has written us a piece on Louis Trup.
“There is no knocking on doors. Trup doesn’t need to; his message, which oscillates between crazy and sensible, has effortlessly been pushed onto our facebook and twitter feeds.”
11.02: It’s a foul day for door-knocking but they’re a relentless bunch. Here are the thoughts of former Cherwell bigwig, Lib Dem supporter and Prospect writer Robin McGhee:
I left in 2012 yet was unable to avoid the OUSU elections this year. The obligatory vile Labour hacks will triumph again, obviously. Please let’s just get it over with so they can go and run the country in 20 years’ time and we can have some peace. Anyway, congratulations on your liveblog, it’s good training for your Guardian work experience.
00.35: A final thought to entertain out captive audience before we head to the land where it’s just me, DJT and a bottle of wine.
A leaked text from one of this year’s candidates poses the following, terrifying, question:
Is Louis Trup the UKIP of this OUSU election?
For more analysis that might give you nightmares, check back in tomorrow and remember to get in touch via #cherwellelection, @Cherwell_Online or emailing editor[@]cherwell.org
20/11, 00.25: In a bold (and petty) move, The OxStu have also launched an election live blog. Consider it a tribute act; the real show is right here. Still, we’ll try and avoid things getting as bitter as Bartram/Cahill (*burrrrn*).
Here are some tweets to warm your late evening cockles:
@Cherwell_Online@tomrutland I think the ‘fuck it, I’ll vote Trup’ vote may be substantial. A lot of second-preference votes for him too
17.27: Oxford Union President Parit Wacharasindhu has confirmed that he will not be endorsing a particular candidate, whilst also exclusively revealing that he is unable to vote due to an undisclosed “rustication” issue.
19/11, 15.34: In case you haven’t seen it already, here’s Cherwell election debate (hosted in Dimblebyesque fashion by our own Patrick Beardmore) where the candidates clash on a number of issues. Definitely worth watching as an introduction to some of the key points of this election.
Preamble: The 2013 OUSU elections looks set to be the closest race in recent history, as four viable candidates battle through polling days with the top job in sight.
Cherwell brings you its news, views and analysis throughout the period, put together by the same team who brough you The Great Storm: Live Blog! and various other hit live blogs.
If you want to have your say, tweet us @Cherwell_Online or use the hashtag #cherwellelection and we’ll publish the best of the bunch on here.
If you want your analysis, photos or hilarious one-liners to find a home on the live blog, then email us at editor[@]cherwell.org any time over the next three days.
Teddy Hall JCR is to remain a democratic institution, as a presidential candidate, who planned on declaring himself ‘Lord Marshal’ and erecting a gold statue of himself in the college’s front quad, lost last night’s election. Michael Rundle, a third year Law student, gained 43 votes to Seb Siersted’s 124. A third candidate, English student Jack Moran, received 47 votes.
Rundle’s manifesto, which featured a Napoleon-inspired mock-up of Rundle, stated his intentions to ‘prevent poor electoral turnout by removing all forms of JCR democracy’, ‘stop difficult constitutional crises by deleting the Constitution’, ‘beautify the Front Quad by installing a golden statue of your Lord Marshal’ and ‘enlarge College rooms by capturing the Principal’s Lodgings and annexing parts of New College’.
During the hustings for the election, Rundle asked, “Why have a president when you can have a Lord Marshal?” His proposals included installing “a second telly above the old one which will encourage bonding”, procuring an “iron throne” for him to sit in during JCR meetings and creating a JCR army which he would “lead like Napoleon or Moses”.
He also reiterated his plans to erect “a bronze statue of me, possibly standing on the Principal” and to impose a ban on democracy, noting that in the latter case the JCR “wouldn’t have to worry about who to vote for and have more time to spend drinking or working on your work”.
Rundle told Cherwell, “I decided to stand because I am the hero Teddy Hall deserves but not the one it needs. The other candidates only adopted the JCR; I was born in it, moulded by it. I didn’t see the light until I was already a man, by then it was nothing to me but blinding.”
Rundle reportedly planed to turn up to the hustings dressed as Bane from The Dark Knight Rises, or Napoleon.
The JCR presidential candidates were asked at the hustings for their stance on several college issues including the recent ‘Blurred Lines’ motion and the rent freeze negotiated by the outgoing JCR president. Ideological differences between the candidates were obvious from the off; where Siersted seemed to agree with Moran that “demanding will not work” when negotiating with the College, Rundle proposed solving accommodation issues by capturing the Principal’s Lodgings, stating that he wanted to “blow a hole in the wall at 4 in the morning… like in The Dark Knight Rises”. Nonetheless, he conceded that he may “ask nicely, possibly with a very large stick,” were he to win the election.
Despite his unsuccessful campaign, Rundle is likely to be undeterred by Siersted’s victory. Speaking to Cherwell before the results for the election were announced, Rundle said, “Talking of chances is silly because whether or not I win the election I will become Lord Marshal of the JCR.”
He added that his first act as Lord Marshal would be “the removal of the constitution and the opening of negotiations to buy tridents.”
Some may not be happy to hear of Rundle’s determination to become Lord Marshal. One Teddy Hall student told Cherwell, “I found Rundle’s pitiable entry into the Presidential Elections the most egregious example of narcissism; it was purely self-serving and only served to undermine a JCR that actually tries to do a hell of a lot to improve the general existence of its students.”
Yet, Tom Wood, an English finalist, disagreed. He commented, “I feel Rundle made, despite being a ‘joke’ candidate, a serious point by running. Neither of the other two candidates appear to be up to the job, basing their campaigns around empty promises of extra bops, and celebratory dinners for the already well-funded sports teams.
“I’m personally very disappointed by the outcome — my employment prospects as an English graduate look significantly bleaker now I can’t hope to be conscripted into Rundle’s army. One can only hope that he will rise from the ashes of this defeat and take control of the JCR by force.”
There was an added pressure during my second year of university; now I was no longer a bewildered fresher, I was somehow expected to know what I wanted to do after graduating. Part of this process was the frantic applying to summer internship schemes. Or at least for my friends it was, as in my usual fashion of attempting to avoid all adult responsibility, I neglected to do this. The most I had done was to book festival tickets. I was then made to feel incredibly inferior by said friends who seemed to have their lives sorted- they’d completed applications throughout the year and would now spend their summers becoming journalists, lawyers and investment bankers.
When summer came around I panicked, realising I did need some sort of work experience that would add to my (pretty barren) CV and maybe give me some sort of clue as to what I wanted to do after university. A month into my vacation I happened to stumble on some last minute opportunities at a well known publishing house. I have never felt particularly inspired by the world of publishing, but thought I would have nothing to lose by submitting an application. I was offered 2 weeks unpaid work experience in the publicity department, and I was pretty happy about it. Despite being rather disorganised when it came to my post-Oxford career, I had managed to secure an opportunity that I thought I could gain valuable skills from.
Unfortunately, that wasn’t quite how it panned out. They probably could have trained a monkey to do my job – all I did from 9 to 5 was put books and press releases in jiffy bags, stick on address labels, and take the packages to the post room. A particular highlight was spending an afternoon putting “signed copy” stickers on to 500 books. People I talked to who were doing work experience in other departments had it worse – they had already graduated and were in disbelief that this was how their degree was being put to use.
What was exasperating was that the publishing house really did need our help. These tasks may have been mindless, but they were necessary. Having work experience candidates meant that the departments were run more efficiently, as the full-time employees weren’t bogged down with these menial jobs, so were able to get on with other more important things. Better still, they were getting this service at the price of just £2.00 for lunch each day and travel expenses (which they still haven’t bothered to pay me back). My experience wasn’t unique, but it also wasn’t the worst. Friends of mine have provided invaluable help for large companies over the summer without seeing any financial reward.
In the grand scheme of things, I was actually pretty fortunate in that this was only a couple of weeks work experience, and I was able to shoulder the costs. However, longer unpaid internships are plaguing a graduate labour market where there are too many worthy candidates and not enough jobs to accommodate them. Candidates are stuck between a rock and a hard place in needing experience to get experience, and for the most part it seems that unpaid internships are the only solution. This system is then incredibly discriminatory against those who are unable to afford to work for free.
Frustratingly, it doesn’t have to be like this. I spoke to Sabina Usher, Marketing Manager at Instant Impact; an intern recruitment company that connects students and graduates with SMEs and only offers paid internships.
“Interns deserve to be paid under NMW legislation if they have a set role, are doing set tasks and have set hours. All our internships are paid to reflect the hard work that these interns do and in turn, employers have access to wider talent and a productive recruit who is likely to stick around for longer”
More needs to be done to raise awareness surrounding this issue. To ask students or graduates to work for up to a year without pay is simply no longer acceptable. The problem lies in awareness and enforcement – although the government has proposed to ban the advertisement of unpaid internships, it would appear the campaign has ground to a halt. Many companies, as well as students, are unaware that most unpaid internships are in violation of National Minimum Wage legislation. It is the responsibility of the government and HMRC to enforce stricter legislation and regulation.
It is reassuring that when I do finally graduate and figure out what career is for me, I have the option of finding an internship that is both mentally stimulating and financially rewarding. It does not have to be like this.
In the past couple of weeks we have witnessed a tremendous tightening of the race for OUSU President, with Alex Bartram slipping into something similar to pole position following a series of blunders by his closest rival.
Ignoring the faults with their website and other campaign mistakes, Jane4Change seem, superficially, to be the best prepared team. But that is undermined by the fact that Jane4Change’s campaign is centred on a flawed policy, one which hasn’t exactly set the student body alight during hustings. The ‘student hub’ seems to be dead-weight and the team would be well advised to start focusing on things that are more important to the average OUSU voter (who is likely to care, primarily, about fees, accommodation and welfare). With OULC somewhat divided, the activist base that was once presumed to be a given is somewhat weakened, but Jane4Change must expect to have the highest number of doorknockers and, without them, their campaign is very much on the rocks.
Team Alex have done an excellent job of manouvering their campaign into a politically neutral zone. Lead agent David Bagg is no stranger to the machinations of OUSU elections and has rigorously upheld the rules (perhaps helped by his friendship with returning officer Nick Cooper) leading to a situation where Team Alex appears to have run the cleanest, and slickest, of the OUSU campaigns. What Team Alex still lacks, however, are a cogent set of policies to bring to the doorstep. Exam feedback is a lost cause and the rest of their policies can be seen as a little tokenistic, meaning that, like Jane, he needs to narrow his campaigning focus to the prime concerns of the average voter. Bartram needs to be able to get a lot of people out and about over the next few days, because his strong current position could still be undermined by lack of activists.
Nathan Akehurst and his team have pitched a gazebo in Radcliffe Square for the past few days, in a move that is reminiscent of the crazy old days of party political campaigning. Subtle treating and tackly t-shirts aside, Reclaim OUSU appears to be struggling to attract a broader student base. Their primary policies are far too dry for the average student, who isn’t going to sit down for a few minutes to find out what exactly a ‘general assembly’ entails. Their fining policy, on the other hand, is a genuine people pleaser and something they need to push on the doorsteps. The focus of the next few days, therefore, ought to be on getting a high turnout for its part-time exec, student trustee and NUS delegate candidates. There are elections to be won there, whereas the sabbatical positions already seem like a lost cause.
The real surprise has been the emergence of Louis J Trup as a serious candidate. After weeks of self-promotion via so-so humour, LJT has stepped out in The OxStu and declared himself to be a realistic antidote to OUSU hacks. It’s a somewhat dubious declaration and one that is build on the foundation of being a joke candidate. Many of his ‘real’ policies are among the most reasonable and well thought out of any candidate, but his decision not to run as a serious candidate from the start has undermined his credibility. LJT has manipulated the Oxford electorate in a more cynical way than any of the conventional ‘hacks’, but if his voters don’t recognise that, he looks on course to take a few hundred votes. Provided, of course, he can get people to turn out which, without any activists to speak of, might be a stretch.
Ultimately, the election will be decided by which slate can get the most people to knock on your doors and drag you to your computer. The top job is a straight fight between Cahill and Bartram that gets bitterer by the day, and it’s not at all clear who’s going to win. Both teams have policy problems, but the organisational problems within the Jane4Change hierarchy could tip the scales in Bartram’s favour. Unless, that is, there’s a heavy turn-out by Labour supporting leafleters, in which case it’s still hers to lose.
The night before voting begins, an OUSU election campaign has been forced to retract claims that its candidates are “not student politicians”.
The Team Alex campaign, led by Alex Bartram, has repeatedly made the claim in husts and on the campaign’s Facebook page. However Nick Cooper, the returning officer (RO), ruled that this was a “False or misleading statement”, ordering that “Team Alex remove any Facebook posts with the claim that their candidates are not student politicians” by 5PM today.
The ruling responded to a complaint made by Jane4Change, Team Alex’s rival slate, that Bartram was misleading voters. David Bagg, lead agent for Team Alex, accepted the allegation that some of their candidates are student politicians.
However, Bagg rejected a second allegation that Bartram himself was a “career student politician”; the returning officer ruled that there was insufficient evidence to conclude whether Bartram, who is currently Balliol’s JCR President, is a career politician.
The RO also commented on the way the OUSU elections have been conducted more broadly. He said, “An election is an opportunity for voters to decide who wants to represent them… I encourage all candidates to continue to promote themselves, and in many cases, to leave voters to determine whether their opponents’ claims are plausible.”
This latest complaint by candidates is the third in the last three days. Yesterday, OUSU ruled that Jane4Change should lose one ninth of their election material, for copying the website design of mixd.com, a technology company based in Yorkshire. After a complaint from Team Alex, Jane4Change’s Jane Cahill said she “accepted the RO’s decision and had already taken down the website and apologised to the company.”
Another complaint, made by the Reclaim OUSU slate against Jane4Change, has not yet been ruled on.
One third year PPEist commented that this year’s OUSU elections are “the bitchiest ever”. She said, “No wonder people are disillusioned with OUSU when all the candidates are stabbing each other in the back.”
The elections open tomorrow morning at 8AM and the results will be announced on Thursday evening.
I’ve been a member of the University of Oxford for 6 terms and 6 weeks. During that time I’ve seen the £9k freshers arrive, complained about the inordinate number of three course dinners, ignored two boat race victories, failed to be elected JCR VP, and watched three different OUSU Presidents come along. And through the incredibly varied experiences of Oxford, there has always been one constant: what does OUSU do and why should we care?
And why should we? OUSU has little to no impact on our lives as students. Its offices are hidden away behind the Combibos garbage, and the only interaction it has with most students is a weekly spam email. Not to mention that it sounds more like a crew date venue than a student union.
So we are left in a place where most people A) don’t care about OUSU, and B) think it does nothing. It’s no surprise, therefore, that the OUSU elections stir up all those inevitable feelings about our student representatives.
If you genuinely don’t care about the student union, then don’t vote. Your right to be apathetic is just that: a right. Turnout for our elections is, generally, abysmal, not because we’re a bunch of uninterested, Russell Brand acolytes who can’t think clearly enough – or operate a computer – to actually vote for a candidate, but because we work hard and think independently, and our independent thought often makes it difficult to join a ‘group’ of thinkers.
So the consequence is that most of you won’t vote and I don’t blame you. But I will vote, because I’ve come to weirdly care about OUSU. I don’t know if it was Martha Mackenzie’s emails, which I automatically binned in my first year, or DJT’s Wolverinesque mutton chops (and bizarre insistence on remembering the ‘J’ in any newspaper reference to him), but I find myself genuinely caring, and worried, about the result of this election.
First things first, Alex Bartram is not a bad candidate and we would by no means be damaging ourselves if we elected him. Likewise, I think it’s fantastic that Nathan Akehurst has managed to organise a proper left-wing slate, and many of the issues that he highlights are things that I wish were brought up more often. But their campaigns are fixed on the trite adage of ‘OUSU doesn’t connect with the people’, which is boring and repetitious. If they really thought that nobody cares about OUSU, they wouldn’t be running for President. In the same way that I didn’t bother going to my Oliver Wyman numeracy test this morning; if they felt that OUSU wasn’t an effective employer, they wouldn’t be applying to work there.
Jane Cahill’s campaign has hit road bump after road bump, and the undercarriage of their election vehicle is hanging by a thread. But stupid electoral marketing shouldn’t make a difference to your choice of OUSU President. Frankly, I could find out that the entire OUSU website had been plagiarised from Facebook and it wouldn’t make a piss-inch of difference to the way I think.
Jane4Change are calling for the student union to have a bigger impact on student lives, not by undermining its previous achievements because they ‘don’t care’, but by developing it into something more accessible to the average student.
If you try and pop in for a drink at the OUSU offices on Wellington Square at the moment, you’ll be greeted by a stern receptionist and the disapproving, albeit moustachioed, face of Tom Rutland. If you try and organise a society meeting on their premises, you better pray your society is about as popular Lonely Nerd Soc, because there is about 20 cubic inches of conference space available. Jane is going to start the process towards a proper student union building, with cheaper drinks than the Purtle Turtle and more bureaucratic looking corridors than the SSL.
Yes, they’re student politicians (a weird charge to level against them in a student political election) and yes, James Blythe does look like he’s involved in a body-swap comedy with Peter O’Toole, but their vision for OUSU involves building on an existing infrastructure. And if you think that existing infrastructure is insufficient, then you’re probably just not understanding the difficulty of being an effective student union at a collegiate university. It’s fucking hard.
Voting in the OUSU elections is about as exciting (and difficult) as shopping at Ocado. About 25% of the student body will probably just ‘forget’ to vote, whilst another 25% are probably too wrapped up in their three-piece management consultancy circle jerk to bother worrying about ‘that ouzo thing’.
But if you’re someone who has the required two minutes to vote, and vaguely cares about the way we’re campaigned for, then I’d like to recommend voting for Jane Cahill. Her campaign management might make you think that she’s about as transparent as a piece of felt, but she’s the only candidate who talks in positive terms about what we can achieve at OUSU, and that’s the least disingenuous way of approaching a student union that suffers from a chronic lack of involvement.
It’s not cool to like OUSU (hence why I was accused of ‘rimming’ them) and I’m sure that, if I post this on my Facebook, I’ll get the usual barrage of ‘nobody cares!’, ‘*yawn*’, and ‘fuck off Nick u stupid hacking cunt’, but I feel like it’s worth writing anyway.
Even though I’ll be gone – unless you give me a Masters (please give me a Masters) – I still find myself, somewhat inexplicably, caring who becomes President of our student union.
Nick Hilton,
Editor of Cherwell and President of Lonely Nerd Soc
