Elections Rules and Regulations – 2024/25
The Undeb Bangor Sabbatical Officer Elections are governed by Bye-Law 7 – Elections, of the Undeb Bangor Constitution (which can be viewed here- www.UndebBangor.com/governancedocuments ) and by the rules and regulations set out below, as approved by the Undeb Bangor Trustee Board and Elections Committee.
Breaking any of these rules may result in sanctions being placed on a candidate, campaigner, or campaign.
Nominations
1. A candidate is only entered into the election when they have successfully attained the following criteria:
1.1. Nominated themselves using the online nominations process by the nominations deadline.
1.2. Is eligible to stand in the elections as defined in the Articles of Association and Bye-Laws.
1.3. Attended the Candidates’ Briefing, or received a verbal briefing from the Deputy Returning Officer if they were not able to attend because of special circumstances.
1.4. Agree to be bound by these rules and Undeb Bangor Bye-Law 7 –Elections.
2. A candidate can only nominate themselves and stand for one position.
Candidate Briefing
1. All candidates must attend the candidate briefing.
2. Candidates who do not attend the candidate briefing will not be permitted to stand in the elections.
3. If any candidate is unable to attend the candidate briefing, the process will be:
3.1. The candidate must submit special circumstances to the Deputy Returning Officer within 2 working days of the date of candidate briefing.
3.2. The candidate must provide details of their special circumstances and why they are/were unable to attend.
3.3. The Deputy Returning Officer will decide whether to uphold the special circumstances.
3.4. Where candidates cannot attend the briefing due to special circumstances, in line with the above, the Deputy Returning Officer will arrange another opportunity for the candidate to receive a verbal briefing.
4. To be entered into the election, candidates must have received a verbal candidate briefing within 4 working days of the initial timetabled candidate briefing. This includes those who may have submitted special circumstances in line with the above. Only in
exceptional circumstances, and at the discretion of the Deputy Returning Officer, will candidates be allowed to stand in the election if the above have not been met.
Manifesto Text
1. To run with a manifesto, candidates must submit their manifesto in Welsh or English by the deadline in the elections timetable.
2. Manifesto text limits are;
2.1. Sabbatical officer Elections: no more than 350 words in whichever language it has been submitted in.
Conduct
1. Candidates and campaigners who through their involvement with, or who hold (or have held) positions of responsibility within Undeb Bangor may not use resources available to them and not to other students. This includes Undeb Bangor purchased equipment and clothing, any central Undeb Bangor mailing lists and official Undeb Bangor social media groups. This list is not exhaustive but does not include any individual club or society held social media accounts or groups.
2. Campaigners may only use mailing lists where it is lawful to do so. In most cases this will require explicit consent of the members on the list to use their details. This rule also applies to WhatsApp groups, whereby people must give express permission to be added to a group, or that they join using the link provided, and that it is clear what the purpose of the group is before joining or being added.
3. Candidates are responsible for all campaign activity carried out in their name; this includes the actions of third parties on their behalf.
4. Candidates and/or their campaigners must not actively campaign and/or use promotional material until the official start of the campaigning period. This includes the use of social media.
5. Candidates must provide a list of their official campaign team to the Students’ Union by the date indicated by the Deputy Returning Officer.
6. Prior to the start of campaigning, campaign teams are permitted to use Facebook, WhatsApp or other social media groups to plan and organise internally, but these groups should be closed, private and limited to the core campaign team.
7. Candidates and campaigners may not:
7.1. Force, coerce or in any way intimidate students, particularly when they are near or in the act of voting.
7.2. vote on behalf of another student
7.3. Take the device of another student to help them vote, as each device must be treated as a ballot station.
7.4. Take the device of another student to show them how to vote, as each device must be treated as a ballot station.
7.5. Use their own electronic devices to obtain votes from others or allow others to use them to vote.
7.6. intimidate any participant in the election
7.7. deliberately sabotage any campaign other than their own
7.8. deface another candidate’s materials, publicity, online media, social networking site etc
7.9. make an attempt to defraud the election
7.10. make any attempt to influence the impartiality of the Returning Officer, Deputy Returning Officer, Elections Committee or Undeb Bangor staff
7.11. discuss the personal traits of another candidate
7.12. Misrepresent another candidate’s views or make claims about themselves or any other candidate that are untrue.
7.13. Set up their own 'voting station', hand voters an electronic device for the purpose of voting, supervise or watch a voter in the act of voting, or demand that voters take out their own electronic device in order to vote immediately
7.14. Be sponsored by an external company or body
7.15. Be endorsed by a University department, School, Service or Staff member.
7.16. Benefit from University staff sending emails to students on their behalf.
7.17. Use official central University social media groups, pages or accounts to aid in campaigning, if they are not also available to all other candidates. This includes, but is not limited to the following types of accounts; College, School, Halls, University Services etc.
7.18. bring the election process into disrepute
8. Candidates and campaigners must:
8.1. Uphold the letter and spirit of the election rules and the Undeb Bangor Equal Opportunities, Zero Tolerance to Harassment and Bilingual policies at all times.
8.2. Follow the laws and regulations of both the land and the University at all times
Elections Spending
1. Candidates have a spending limit, which may not be exceeded or increased.
2. Spending limits are the following
2.1. £30 campaign spending limit, to be spent within the rules of the election. This does not include printing costs.
2.2. £30 which can go on printing. No more than £30 can be spent on physical printing.
3. All election spending must be accounted for, with receipts or evidence of spending, submitted to elections@undebbangor.com by the deadline outlined in the elections timetable. Candidates must also inform the elections team if no spending has taken place so that this can be confirmed.
4. If any candidate exceeds spending limits, this may lead to sanctions being put in place by the Deputy Returning Officer.
5. Everything used in the election is given a cash value by the Returning Officer, or their nominated Deputy (excluding items listed in Section5.1 below). For clarity, this rule
applies to ‘campaign gifts’ which may have cost you nothing but hold a ‘real world’ cash value.
6. All resources and methods that you use in your election campaign that could be given a monetary value should be available to all of the other candidates. It is the responsibility of the candidate to check this before using them with the Deputy Returning Officer.
7. No candidate may be sponsored by an external company or body.
8. The following items for example are readily available to all candidates and their supporters and so their fair use does not carry a cash value:
8.1. Old T-shirts; Paint; Old bedsheets; Marker Pens; Blu-tack; Pre-used cardboard; Old wood; Pencils; String; Sticky tape; Pins, Pre-owned Fancy Dress items. This list is not exhaustive and any questions should be directed to the Deputy Returning Officer.
8.2. This rule has been included to assist candidates in making election time exciting, vibrant and high profile. The returning officer and their deputy are aware that this rule may be open to abuse and will be closely monitoring campaign resources as a result. Please remember that they are the people who determine ‘fair use’.
Printed Publicity Material
1. Sabbatical officer Elections
1.1. Printed publicity is limited to £30 worth of printing.
1.2. Candidates must do their own printing.
1.3. Printing must be done using University printers.
1.4. Candidates must provide receipts to claim any printing costs back.
1.5. If it is suspected that printing has been done on non-university printers, the Deputy Returning Officer may ask to see proof of print receipts to show it has been done on university printers.
1.6. Candidates are responsible for the design of their own publicity material
1.7. Candidates may produce as many designs as they wish.
Non-Printed Publicity Material
1. Candidates are permitted to use social media for elections publicity and campaigning in line with the rules.
2. Candidates are permitted to create videos, podcasts and other forms of media for elections publicity and campaigning in line with the rules.
3. Any spending on social media promotional campaigns and adverts count towards elections spending. Spending on this must be evidenced with receipts to ensure the rules on spending are not exceeded.
4. Any spending on the creation of non-printed publicity material and media count towards elections spending. Spending on these must be evidenced with receipts to ensure the rules on spending are not exceeded.
Other Publicity Material
1. Candidates are permitted to produce and/or purchase other publicity and campaign material in line with the rules and in line with the rules set out under elections spending.
Translation and Bi-lingual Policy
1. Anything hosted by Undeb Bangor must be bilingual – Welsh and English. Therefore, for example, candidates manifestos will be sent for translation to be displayed bilingually by Undeb Bangor.
2. We encourage candidates to produce bilingual publicity material.
3. Candidates’ publicity material does not have to be bilingual.
4. Candidates may text for translation if they so wish, but should allow a reasonable amount of time to carry out the translation work. Time frames around translation will be communicated to candidates at the candidates briefing. Delivery of this translation cannot always be guaranteed, although all efforts will be made.
Incumbent Candidates
1. Incumbent candidates must not campaign when on work time and must take annual leave for any form of active campaigning. This includes any campaigning on online platforms and social media.
2. A timetable must be submitted to the Deputy Returning Officer detailing work time and campaign time. This must also include evenings. This must be submitted prior to campaign activity and not in retrospect. A template will be provided to candidates to fill in.
3. Undeb branded work clothing cannot be worn when campaigning.
4. Undeb social media accounts, for example, Sabbatical Officer Facebook accounts or pages, cannot be used for campaigning or promotion of elections.
5. Undeb mailing lists cannot be used for campaign purposes.
6. When visiting groups to campaign, it must be clear that incumbent candidates are not in attendance on Students’ Union business, in their Sabbatical Officer role. This must be detailed on timetabled campaigning time.
7. Students’ Union resources must not be used to aid campaigning.
Complaints and Rules Breaches
1. All complaints made about candidates, campaigners, election officials or the voting process should be submitted using the official Elections Complaint Form, by e-mail, to the Deputy Returning Officer. Only complaints submitted using the official Elections Complaint Form will be considered. The complaint must:
1.1. Be factual
1.2. contain clear evidence of a breach of the rules
1.3. Include sufficient evidence to allow an investigation to take place
1.4. Highlight the election rule that has been broken.
2. In the first instance, the Deputy Returning Officer will consider any complaint and make a judgement on whether it can be resolved informally or if it should be dealt with as a formal complaint.
3. If it can be resolved informally, once resolved informally, this will be the end of the process.
4. In cases where the complaint either cannot be resolved informally, or a judgement has been made that it cannot be resolved informally, it will be dealt with as a formal complaint.
5. Once being treated as a formal complaint, the Deputy Returning Officer will make a ruling on the complaint within 24 hours.
6. The Deputy Returning Officer can also make a decision to informally or formally investigate rules breaches and subsequently make rulings, if evidence of rules breaches are brought to their attention.
7. The following process will be followed when investigating complaints and rules breaches:
7.1. Review of the complaint and evidence of rules breaches. This may include speaking to any complainants or those who can provide evidence as well as seeking additional information such as CCTV footage or website logs (these are not limited).
7.2. Contacting the candidate in question to outline the complaint and/or rule breaches.
7.3. The candidate will have the opportunity to respond to the complaint and/or alleged rules breaches. Once contacted to respond, the candidate has 2 hours to make a response. If they do not respond within 2 hours, they will be deemed to not wish to make a response.
7.4. Following a review of the complaint, evidence of alleged rules breaches, and speaking to any necessary parties, including the candidate in question, the Deputy Returning Office will decide whether, on the balance of probability, a rule breach has occurred.
7.5. The decision will be communicating to a candidate in writing and also verbally. Candidates must make themselves available to speak to the Deputy Returning if required.
8. If a rule breach has occurred, the sanctions available to the Deputy Returning Officer are:
8.1. Warning a candidate of their future conduct.
8.2. Taking steps to level the playing field to right an election regulation breech.
8.3. Fining a candidate through either reducing the amount of money they may spend, or by confiscating printed publicity material.
8.4. Prohibiting a candidate and their campaigners from campaigning for a period of time.
8.5. Banning a campaigner from the rest of the campaign (where the campaigner is not the candidate).
8.6. Restriction of inclusion in SU Elections publicity.
8.7. Requiring the candidate to promote other candidates alongside themselves
8.8. Requiring a formal public apology from the candidate
9. In addition to all of the above sanctions, the following are also available:
9.1. Suspending a candidate from the election pending an investigation
9.2. Suspending the election process pending an investigation
9.3. Disqualifying a candidate
9.4. Recommending to the Board of Trustees that the election be re-run or a vote annulled. The Board of Trustees would then need to make a decision on whether to uphold this recommendation based on the evidence.
10. Candidates may appeal against decisions made by the Deputy Returning Officer by submitting their appeal in writing, by e-mail to elections@undebbangor.com
11. Candidates must notify the Deputy Returning Officer of their wish to appeal within two hours of the decision being made, and submit their appeal within six hours of the decision being made, following the appeal procedure detailed below.
11.1. Submit appeal in writing to elections@undebbangor.com
11.2. The appeal should clearly outline the grounds of appeal, including any evidence.
11.3. The appeal will be sent to the Returning Officer.
11.4. The Returning Officer will make a formal ruling on the appeal.
11.5. The Returning Officers decision is final and will be the end of the process.
11.6. The candidate will be informed of the outcome of the appeal.
12. Any complaints made to the Deputy Returning Officer will be acknowledged via e-mail return within 24 hours, if this is not received please do not assume that we have received it - contact 01248 388000 to check.
13. Complaints regarding the conduct of the Deputy Returning Officer should be made in writing directly to the Director of the Students’ Union.
14. Complaints must be submitted before the election count has taken place. Only complaints about the process of the count itself will be considered once the count has started, and these must be submitted within 24 hours of the results being declared.