LSE Students' Union

London School of Economics Students' Union

Institution	London School of Economics
Location	Houghton Street, London, UK
Members	8,810
Affiliations	NUS, ULU, National Postgraduate Committee, Aldywch Group
Website	www.lsesu.com

The London School of Economics Students' Union (LSESU) is the representative and campaigning body for students at LSE to the London School of Economics and to other bodies, covering areas such as quality of education, hall of residence provision, fees, equalities and accessibility for students with disabilities and other related areas. It also provides welfare support, through an Advice and Counselling Centre and various support funds. All students at LSE are automatically co-opted as members of the Union.

The LSESU has around 150 societies and 30 sports clubs, three bars, CRUSH! London's biggest student club night, a cafe, a Media Group (consisting of a newspaper (The Beaver), journal (The Script), radio station (PuLSEfm) and TV network (LooSE TV), gymnasium and photocopying shop. London Student also distributes on campus as members are also members of the University of London Union.

History

The LSE SU has often been in national focus for its activities. In 1967, David Adelstein, president of the Students' Union, and Marshall Bloom, president of the Graduate Students' Association, were suspended from the School for taking part in a protest against the appointment of Walter Adams as Director of the School in which a porter died of a heart attack. Adams had previously been in Rhodesia and was accused of complicity in the regime's white minority rule. The suspensions were reversed five days after students began a hunger strike in opposition to the move. An American citizen, Bloom committed suicide in 1969 when he was called up to fight in Vietnam.

The LSESU once again made the news during 1969 for its student activism when radical students closed the school for three weeks. The protest were against the appointment of Walter Adams as director of the LSE and his order of installation of security gates at the LSE. These gates were later removed.

The LSE SU elected Winston Silcott, one of the Tottenham Three who were originally convicted of the murder of PC Keith Blakelock during the Broadwater Farm riot and then released when the evidence used to convict him was found to be unsage, as Honorary President as a protest against miscarriages of justice. This led to a large amount of hate mail, much of it racist in nature, including death threats being sent to the LSE SU. There was media outrage, particularly amongst the tabloid press, at the action.

Historically, the LSESU is politically left-leaning with many strong socialist, and more recently green political societies. Currently, its largest party political society is the LSESU Green Party.

The LSESU voted in March 2005 to stay affiliated to the National Union of Students (NUS) and is also part of the University of London Union (ULU) and the National Postgraduate Committee (NPC). The current Honorary President of the LSESU is the Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal and the Honorary Vice President is the Burmese student activist Thet Wing Aung.

Recent Achievements

The LSESU has recently campaigned successfully to secure a Living Wage for the cleaners on campus and within the LSE's residences. The campaign was led by students, cleaners, academics and The East London Citizens Organisation (TELCO) and has involved several high profile protests, petitions, UGM motions and consistent lobbying of the School's administration in an effort to lift cleaners out of poverty pay.

In 2006, the LSESU voted to divest from 14 listed arms companies and are currently lobbying the School to do the same.

Union General Meeting

The LSESU is the only students' union in the UK to retain a weekly General Meeting which all members can attend. The UGM is the sovereign body of the Union. There are reports and questions to all the various officers and committees of the LSESU before motions.

The UGM can remove any elected union official from office and sets union policy to which all elected officials must adhere.

Any two people can move a motion on any subject, which is then debated at the UGM. These motions can be serious, setting policy and making major financial decisions, or can be much more light-hearted.

Executive Committee

The LSESU Executive Committee is comprised of sixteen officers. Four of these positions (General Secretary, Treasurer, Education & Welfare Officer and Communications Officer) are full-time positions, known as Sabbatical Officers or 'Sabbs'. Students, usually at the end of their period of study, but sometimes in between years, take a 'year out' and are paid to help run the LSESU. They are paid circa £22,500 - a recent UGM motion reduced their salaries after criticism that their pay was the highest in the country compared to other students' unions. The remaining twelve officers are part-time and include two non-voting members - the General Course Students' Representative and Athletics Union President (non-voting because they are not elected in a cross-campus ballot). The 'Exec', particularly the four Sabbs, carry on the day-to-day running of the Union. Positions are elected annually by use of the Single Transferable Vote system.

The executive positions are:

Position	2006 - 2007	2007 - 2008
Sabbatical Officers
General Secretary	Jimmy Tam	Fadhil Bakeer Marker
Treasurer	Joel Kenrick	Libby Meyer
Education & Welfare Officer	Alexandra Vincenti	Ruhana Ali
Communications Officer	Ali Dewji	Kayt Berry
Part-Time Officers
Anti-Racism Officer	Shanela Haque	Amina Adewusi
Environment & Ethics Officer	Aled Dilwyn Fisher	Aled Dilwyn Fisher
International Students' Officer	Fadhil Bakeer Markar	Firoz Noordeen
Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender (LGBT) Students' Officer	Alex Finnegan	Dominic Rampat
Mature & Part-Time Students' Officer	Michail Retsinas	Ziyaad Lunat
Postgraduate Students' Officer	James Caspell	Elected in November
Residences Officer	Louise Robinson	Louise Robinson
Societies Officer	Arthur Krebbers	Carys Morgan
Students with Disabilities (SWD) Officer	Emma Hallgren	Lizzie Fison
Women's Officer	Zoe Sullivan	Daisy Mitchell-Forster
Non-Voting Members
General Course Students' Representative	Anushka Shenoy	Elected in November
Athletics Union (AU) President	Kav Patel	???
Returning Officer	Adrian Beciri	James Bacon

Committees

There are two principal committees to which students are elected that help in the running of the LSESU; Constitution & Steering, which ensures the actions of the LSESU are legal and in accordance with the Constitution and Codes of Practice of the LSESU, and Finance & Services, which assists the Treasurer in the preparation of the annual budget and acts as a check on the financial actions of the LSESU. There are then myriad other committees and sub-committees that administer the LSESU.

Staff

As well as the full time 'Sabbs', there are assorted full- and part- time staff. These include a General Manager (Gethin Roberts), Finance Manager (Sam Kung), Societies Manager (Alice Kington), Entertainments Manager (Nick Pauro aka Bang!), Sports Administrator (Jarlath o'Hara) and various people, including students employed on a part-time basis, involved in the provision of services such as the shop, copy shop, bars, cafe and advice centre.

Notable Sabbatical Officers

• General Secretary - Martin Lewis
• Entertainments and Societies - Gary Delaney
• Entertainments and Author - Nick Pauro

External links

• lsesu.com, the LSESU website