Community has once again dominated the polls, consolidating their control of the Student Union in a campaign week with “the worst behaviour since 2005,” according to Returning Officer Stephen Luntz.

This election saw 4806 total ballots received, a disappointing slump in voter turnout and an approximately 34 per cent reduction from last year’s historic 7320, a record since UMSU’s establishment.  

Who’s Who?

Community is the dominant ticket at UMSU, having been in control of the executive since 2023. Although Community continue to run non-factional candidates on their ticket, they’re decidedly controlled by students from the Shop, Distributive and Allied Employees Association (SDA) subfaction of Labor Right.

Growth, a newly formed ticket, is comprised of many students previously involved with or elected under the Community ticket. Their emergence reflects internal dissatisfaction with the factional control and topdown approach exerted by the SDA over Community.  

Activate - Left Action is the product of a ticket merger between Activate, a coalition of students from Labor Left and the Greens, and Left Action, the longstanding Socialist Alternative ticket. Activate - Left Action also subsumed members of the Transport Workers’ Union (TWU), another Labor Right subfaction, who last year ran under the now defunct ticket, More!. 

Rebuild, the campus Liberals, once again ran a half-hearted campaign, managing to lose their last spot on Students’ Council. Their steady decline in past years has seen Rebuild instead switch tactics and attempt to stack clubs on campus, with middling success.

2025 also featured an electoral debut from Students Against War (SAW), a pro-Palestine activist group on campus. SAW attempted to run under the banner of “Fight 4 Palestine: Cut the Ties”, though were unsuccessful in correctly registering their ticket and did not pick up any positions.

Community, Activate - Left Action, and Growth were the only tickets to run candidates in almost every position, and represented the overwhelming majority of campaigners on campus during the election week. Had the contest been between only Community and one other, the election may have weakened Community’s dominance. Nevertheless, UMSU’s optional preferential voting style, a three way contest between tickets and the strength of incumbency once again delivered Community near full control of the Student Union for 2026.

Office Bearers

Community has maintained what will be its fourth consecutive year in control of the executive, again successfully winning the President and General Secretary positions.

While elections past saw many tickets engage in non-compete deals, no such arrangements were in place this year, although Community did not contest the Clubs & Societies office. Community therefore succeeded in winning every department they contested, having won the Queer office back from Activate.

Independent Media, Independents for Southbank and independent 2024 Indigenous Office Bearer Noah Kellett were all uncontested in the Media, Southbank and Indigenous departments, respectively. No nominations were received for the Indigenous committee, nor for any Burnley positions.

Students’ Council

Students’ Council is the chief decision-making body of the Student Union, with 22 total positions. This year’s election saw Community maintain its dominance, electing 11 Councillors. Left Action and Activate both lost a Councillor each. Independent Media and Independents for Southbank both retained their one Council position each. Having this year lost their singular seat on Students’ Council, Rebuild will no longer have any elected representatives within UMSU. However with the Indigenous Councillor position uncontested, the 2026 Council will begin with only 21 members. Community’s 11 positions will therefore become a majority, should all Councillors be in attendance.

Committees

While last year Community won a controlling majority on seven of nine committees, this election saw its control overturned. Activate - Left Action and Growth will collectively hold a majority on six of nine committees. Independents for Southbank and Community were both uncontested in winning the Southbank and Disabilities committees, respectively. 

National Union of Students Delegates

UMSU’s annual elections also elect seven delegates to the National Union of Student’s National Conference in December (NatCon). While candidates for NUS run on tickets, it’s the faction that delegates caucus with that truly matters. 

As tickets, Community is affiliated with the SDA subfaction of Student Unity (Labor Right), Activate - Left Action is a composite of students aligned with Socialist Alternative and National Labor Students (Labor Left), and while Growth is non-factional, many of their members split contentiously with Labor Right earlier this year.

This year, Community retained three delegates, Growth won two, and Socialist Alternative and National Labor Students both lost one each. Whether Growth’s delegates will attend NatCon as independents, or alternatively either proxy to or caucus with another faction, is unclear. 

Conduct and Tribunal

Returning Officer Stephen Luntz is responsible for overseeing the electoral process each year. Luntz described this year’s election as the worst for campaigner conduct 2005. “The conduct this year was terrible, both in the sheer volume of medium-severity breaches, as well as the number of more serious breaches. Nothing like this has occurred since UMSU was founded.” 

“Some people on every team behaved well, but the nature of the system as it currently exists rewards bad behaviour and makes policing difficult such that we were simply overwhelmed.”

Farrago is aware of multiple appeals lodged with the Election Tribunal regarding campaigner conduct and procedural fairness during the election. The Election Tribunal is expected to meet in October.