The #LeadLSE Elections at The London School of Economics Students’ Union (LSESU) operates in a fair and democratic manner, where all candidates are governed by a clear set of policies, procedures, protocols and election rules.

Unfortunately, this year the election rules have been breached by a candidate, resulting in LSESU taking the difficult decision to disqualify them from this year’s Leadership Race for the position of General Secretary. The rule that has been breached is outlined as follows:

"Candidates and campaigners must maintain a reasonable distance (around 2 metres) from anyone who is casting their vote. You cannot, under any circumstances, stand over a student or talk to them while they are voting – even if they ask you for help. If they are struggling to vote, take them to an SU polling station or ask them to email us."

The candidate in question was given the opportunity to appeal the decision made by the Returning Officer as set out in the LSESU Bye Laws. The candidate submitted an appeal that was considered by 3 members of the Democracy Committee. Following their review of the evidence, the original decision was upheld.

As The Students’ Union uses the single transferable voting system, we would like to reassure all voters that their next preference votes were taken into account during the count.

As a matter of course LSESU always undertakes a review of how our elections have been delivered. We are confident that all decisions were followed according to due process and best practice. However, given the impact this experience has had on some of the candidates involved, we will be conducting an external review this time around and will endeavour to update the community accordingly.

LSESU has a firm zero tolerance stance towards any form of harassment and/or bullying. This means that we will not tolerate it in any of our spaces. If you experience any of these you can report it via the following channels:

• You can make a formal complaint through the Unions' complaint procedure 

• You can also reach out to our Advice Service on how to make a complaint regarding any sort of bullying or harassment.

• You can also report directly to LSE by following the steps found here