Where to start.
After a loooooooooooooooong 2 hour wait for the results, during which the poor sabbatical candidates looked like they were about to die, the count began!
We’ll skim over some of the less exciting results: COM was basically uncontested, RON won loads of Law Council positions, and various other people won uncontested Action Group/ Officer/ School Rep positions.
We had an early Convenership announcement with Welfare. Callum Leslie won after 3 rounds, beating Jaye Ware and Calum Hay. Callum has been an avid eusalicious reader and seems very keen, so good luck to him!
Finally, after about 3 hours of waiting, the first sabb results were announced. Michael Buble’s Cry Me A River started to play and everyone tensed up in their seats as incumbent Sam Hansford took to the stage to announce the results for VP Services. In the first round, we sadly had to say goodbye to Jo Smith who won 300 first preferences, with 5th place RON beating him with 353. Then in order, we bid adieu to RON, Kristen and Ashleigh. Then it was between Jacob Bllomfield and Philippa Faulkner. Philippa was bounds ahead from the very start and was duly elected! Well done her! And good job to all the fun VPS candidates for a fun, good-natured race. Philippa’s winner’s song was a classic choice, Eye Of The Tiger (another well done). She seemed very like ‘can’t believe this is happening’ during her speech, thanking her campaign team and asking the audience to make sure that she kept her promises!
Did eusalicious readers correctly guess the VPS race results? Shockingly accurate in terms of order, well done hacks…
The first biggish uncontested positions were Gabi Jones vs RON for Societies Convener and Josh Jones vs RON for Schools and Inductions Officer. Phewy for both of them were were successful against that grumpy old RON.
Both Matt McPherson’s campaign managers, Stuart Tooley and Hugh Murdoch won their elections for External and Academic Services conveners but Defend Edinburgh’s Mike Shaw won against Stephen Donnelly. Sophie McCallum beat RON to secure her place as Postgraduate Convener too!
The VPAA result was the first big shock of the night. From the results of our polls which we had obviously spied on pre-count, we thought the result would reflect the poll too!
As you can see here, I think most of us were expecting Andrew Burnie to walk it, but Mike Williamson won convincingly in the end. This was definitely the win of the night for Defend Edinburgh, and Mike thanked the group in his speech, especially Aoife Keenan and Kate Harris (sorry if there was someone else I’ve forgotten). We’re really gutted for Andrew, as he’s lovely and it’s obviously really hard to loose as the favourite, but Mike seems fab and we’re sure he’ll be a great VPAA.
The Defend Edinburgh vs Labour/EUSA hack types thing was heating up, with the positions being won falling in a pretty even way. No one could call the big one…
Nest was VPSA. You were very good at predicting this one too…
The results of this one were pretty much proportionally reflective of the poll we did here with Emma finally reaching the quota in the 3rd round. Unfortunately, Anna Forrest didn’t show up at the count, which lots of people commented on as being rather unsportsmanlike, but Emma thanked both candidates for a fun and fair race which was nice. Fantastic song choice with Simply The Best btw Ems! And Emma also said a big thank you to her campaign manager Josh Jones, who was genuinely ace and we hope will one day run for a sabb himself. A proper good egg that one.
As you can see, the tension was building….
First though, we had the election for Teaching and Learning Convener. Possibly one of the most exciting of the night! It ended up as a RIDICULOUSLY close run between NUS Scotland hack Claire Rackley and Defend Edinburgh’s Innes MacLeod, with Rackers winning by a whisker. Very nail-biting stuff, especially with the Presidential election LOOMING over us.
And then it was time. Liz Rawlings took to the stage and everyone went ‘ooooooooh’. Can’t even imagine how nervous the candidates must have been after such an agonisingly long wait. Here’s the results of our poll:
As you can see, the poll has Matt and McAsh as the clear frontrunners, Imola and Ian in the middle, with the three others bringing up the rear. So you were quite spot on in terms of the grouping; the EUSA hacks Matt and McAsh leading, with the ‘normal student’ candidates Imola and Ian getting about the same proportion (I think 600ish votes), and the others picking up the scraps (soz). Obviously though, you were wrong about the final result, because in the end Matt won by a clear margin of about 300 votes (but close given that 5000 students voted in this race).
Matt used his speech to offer the hand of friendship and unity to Defend Edinburgh which was widely applauded, with the exception of a few (notably Ledys Sanjuan, failed External Convener and NUS Delegate candidate, who rather unkindly heckled Matt during his speech. Not very nice or gracious). While this speech was like watching a big chunk of cheese on the stage, it was probably very necessary, so good on Matt. He also thanked the superhuman Stuart Tooley, who did a great job running his campaign and who has a very good track record now after his wins for Liz Rawlings and Stevie Wise last year (best get asking him to be your campaign manager for next year early guys, he’ll be scooped up quick!).
Despite a few surprises, this looks like a GREAT team. It will be very interesting to see how they all get on and reconcile their differences around education funding. Good luck guys!
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