Breaking News: Warwick SU breaches the Education Act 1994, after overturning election in 'dangerous precedent'

Warwick Students Union has once again sparked outrage, after overturning the election of the Welfare and Campaigns Officer. It stands accused of breaching the Education Act 1994. Following the unprecedented move, the ruling has been castigated as 'dangerous' by multiple former Returning Officers at the Union. 

Charlton Sayer, the Welfare and Campaigns Officer-elect.

Charlton Sayer was elected the new Welfare and Campaigns Officer 2021-22, in February. This was, until the Students Union overturned the result (on the 10th March), in excess of one week after the election - significantly after the final appeals date.

The Returning Officer retrospectively cited that quorum was not reached, after physically removing over 700 votes from the final total.

The Student Union did not inform other candidates that Loshini Subendran had withdrawn after the ballots were finalized, until the penultimate day of voting. Under the Union's proportional representation system and existing policy for withdrawn candidates, the first preference votes casted for Loshini were redistributed to the other candidates, following the voters' second preference votes. This was a system intended to ensure that nobody's vote would ever be wasted. However, not this year..

Single Transferable Voting (copyright: Electoral Reform Society)

After announcing the winner, and after the closing date of the appeals period, the Returning Officer removed some 700 second preference votes, declared the election to not be quorate, and overturned the result. Many involved in student politics have described this as a "very strange case of a student union retrospectively reversing an election result, after no wrongdoing from either candidate, and after the conclusion of the appeals period".

Two former Warwick Students Union Returning Officers, in a joint statement, have condemned the move as seriously flawed.

"The Warwick SU ruling sets a dangerous precedent that you can withdraw at any time in the week to essentially overturn a result, that will bring the whole process and it's integrity into question"

The candidates have been given just 48 hours to appeal. [Edit: A one-week extension for appealing has now been granted.]

The national press have already taken a serious interest, into what prima facie evidence suggests, is a major breach under Provision 22 of the Education Act 1994 - covering 'fair and properly conducted' elections.

The Office for Students, the independent Universities' Regulator.

The Eye is informed that the Universities Minister, and the Office for Students, have since been briefed on this ongoing case.

The story continues to develop.