There are flaws with both candidates’ arguments here, I think it was a shame Patrick Wolohan could not be present, but as he explained (and credit where it’s due for commenting!) he will be attending further Hustings next week.

Sam makes some interesting points but I can’t seem to see past the last year, where he hasn’t fulfilled much of his promises, only further engaged with his KBC cronies (who you will find loyally bullying everyone into voting for him, most likely in Newman!) and done little to prove he was worthy of the position. He seems to only shift into gear with elections approaching and knowing him in person still does not inspire confidence in me that he can overcome his FF background and social agenda. Also he proposes to make an iPhone app, that’s a brilliant idea, except wait, oh yeah there already is one!

Shane is also an interesting candidate, he inspires more confidence as I have high hopes that he is not in this for political ladder climbing and may not turn out to be full of ideas and words and little action as so many of our Sabbats have, however, and i can actually understand his desire to not run against ultimate jack-the-lad social climber Micheal for self-esteem reasons.

All in all this debate has confused me even more and I may just have to revert to Sam’s old enemy RON!

Hear hear.

“It’s unfair to label Wolohan as a bad gender equality officer.” Right, well it is obvious to see you all have your Wolohan t-shirts on then.

I am not involved in student union politics, but it is incredibly accurate to say Wolohan has been an absolute joke as part of the SU executive.

Who cares about Regina Brady, is she running for elections this year – NO. The attention from Wolohan is trying to be deflected to Brady in order to justify his utter failure this year.

Apparently Wolohan ran as a joke for gender equality officer, which I understand is only speculation, but the very fact that he has treated his position with so little respect highlights it was all a joke and he used his executive position as a platform to run for sabatical this year. I am only judging what I have seen. And I know Rachel Breslin had to single handidly organce gender equality week. This is Wolohan’s portifolio and he couldn’t even organise the one week which he had signed up to do.

I appreciate giving me your number and email address to contact you Patrick, but to be honest you just excused how you couldn’t attend hustings and how difficult your life is as a student cos you have so much college work to do. Welcome to the real world of being a student. It would have been nice if you addressed how poor your preformance was this year as oart of UCDSU executive.

Speaks for itself no? Plus, why argue with his own, highly accurate evaluation.

And Regina ran a very successful “Pink Week”, she had women from all platforms of society on campus giving talks etc; , she also helped to co-ordinate a highly successful competition with The Marie Keating Foundation and Britvic; raising cancer awareness and 5 ucd students won oxegen tickets.

I don’t think it’s fair to say that Wolohan was a bad gender equality officer. I hadn’t heard of Regina Brady when she was Woman’s Officer either.

I have no experience with Wolahan at all, never seen him on campus, never heard a lecture adress. The only ones I’ve heard is name mentioned is people talking about how bad a term as gender equaity officer he had. I try not to base my opinions on that but at the moment he is trailing in my books. Maybe he’ll step it up this week however.

I’m not at all surprised that Comer wanted welfare! His manifesto reads like a C&C candidates and his arguments keep going back to being visible and getting students to come to you. Only a small number of students need the personal help of the education officer and committing so much time so that everyone else on campus knows who you are wil certainly waste time that could be spent far better.

For these reasons and the fact the Geoghegan is the only one with relevant experience (who could possibly be more experienced than the current officer?!) I will be voting for Sam and will encourage my friends to do the exact same!

It is true Shane wanted to run for welfare, one of my friends is heavily involved in welfare crew and Comer didn’t want to split the vote and didn’t think he could beat Micheál. His manifesto comes across as not having been researched very well and it’s not very education-y. It’s kind of like he wanted to run for Welfare or C+C but Education seemed like an easier race.I was in a lecture the other day and he had someone else lecturing adressing for him, I think yer man was the lawsoc editor? Seems unprofessional and shows a lack of committment to me. He has absolutely no experience and strikes me as someone who is running for a sabbatical position merely for the sake of it, rather than because he is passionate about our education or even vaguely interested in it.

Wolly seems like a lovely lad but I just don’t understand his motivation for running for this position. Education is arguably the most important position in the SU and under his experience he cites ” volunteered in an animal sheder[sic]” as being relevant experience for this job. I’m not sure which is worse, his delusion, his lack of experience, or his seeming lack of committment to the race. We don’t need a “jack the lad” for education; go run for Ents instead. And Gender Equality? Hah,don’t get me started. He described himself as the “worst officer in the history of the SU”…and I have to admit I’m not going to disagree.

Then finally there’s Geoghegan;the only one with any relevant experience… He’s had his flaws, the book shop debacle being one of them but at least he admits the year wasn’t perfect, admitting there was a “steep learning curve”. However I think the pros outweigh the cons. I’ve had Sam personally help with me an important and very sensitive issue and he helped me with the utmost professionalism and generally kindness. He’s definitely not been perfect but I think he’s done a pretty good jobs overall. I know that if I have another problem next year if its Wolly or Comer in that office I won’t feel comfortable going to them; I don’t trust them to mnage my degree any better than I can.