Welcome to my website!

As president of Hull University Union I have proven my ability to make a Students' Union a grassroots campaigning organisation.

I am standing for the Block of 12 to seek your support in making our NUS a grassroots campaigning organisation.

Since being elected at Hull, I have seen a different side to the National Union from the loud, aggressive atmosphere of Conference. At successive events ranging from summer training to the strategic conversations, I have seen that our NUS is full of potential. And the potential is to deliver what our members (both union and individual) need.

I believe that our members want an NUS that does three things: campaigning, building and succeeding.

CAMPAIGNING: NUS is entering a hugely important time, with the dangers of a market developing within education bringing all that we strive to achieve sharply into focus. NUS must prepare now for the battle to keep the cap, and must lay the ground work so that future generations of student leaders will be taken seriously at the national level, and will succeed where our members currently view us as failing.

BUILDING: NUS needs to focus on its collectivist ideals, and promote the belief that we are stronger together and weaker apart. NUS must provide leadership right across the FE and HE sectors, supporting strong student unions away from our traditional power bases. I will lead the fight on the NEC to make sure that all students unions get the tools and support from the National Union that they need to succeed.

SUCCEEDING: NUS needs to be ambitious in the targets it sets; however, those targets must be within reach. There is little benefit to our grassroots members if we make ourselves easily sidelined as a national body run to promote the self interests of our activists rather than the broader interests of our 7 million members. On the NEC, I will fight to make sure that we are at all times more relevant, more in-touch with real students and more successful than ever before.

I am standing for Block because I believe that my record as a student officer demonstrates that I have the skills, dedication and experience to represent you on the NEC.

I’ll post some more about my record in office at Hull here soon. In the meantime, take a look at my full manifesto. It would be great to talk to as many people as possible about the ideas that I’ve touched upon here. I want to build my manifesto in the same style that I want to carry out my duties on the NEC: by talking with as many student officers as I can.

So please do comment here with your ideas or thoughts!

All the best,

Ed.