Glasgow Guardian Issue 5 Election Special

GLASGOWGUARDIAN.CO.UK

MARCH 5TH 2013

Interview with The 1975

CULTURE – MUSIC Election Top Trumps

CENTRE SPREAD 8-915

PAGE 3

“I suspect that if Salmond was prosecuting a Yes vote on all nerds joining him to set up a new country on Arran, he would probably have it in the bag by now. ”

GHOSTS OF MARS- 13

CULTURE &

“The SRC is suffering from an crisis in engagement and democracy and the worst part is nobody

even notices.”

EDITORIAL - 10

VIEWS ‘‘

“11% of people hold postgraduate degrees. The large majority of these come from the richest 20% of the population,”

POSTGRAD INEQUALITY – 3

NEWS ...

Where is the

democracy?•72%ofSRCpositionsuncontestedorunfilled•Electioninterviews:page4-7•Electionseditorial:page10

2 GLASGOWGUARDIAN.CO.UKGLASGOWGUARDIAN.CO.UK GLASGOWGUARDIAN.CO.UK

Claire Diamond Gareth Davis

Romanian and Bulgarian students studying in the UK are facing major obstacles in being able to work due to the UK Border Agency’s (UKBA) delay in processing work permit applications as part of the restrictions placed on mi-grants from both nations by the govern-ment.

The policy has sparked widespread criticism of the UKBA from student organisations. A Glasgow University campaign has demanded its reversal, claiming it is discriminatory. The work restrictions are among the toughest of any imposed on migrants from any-where worldwide.

The delay in applicant processing comes as the government looks to curb migration rates by tens of thousands. Romania and Bulgaria joined the Euro-pean Union in 2007, allowing their citi-zens freedom of travel within the EU. But other EU countries are permitted to impose transitional controls on their access to the labour market and the du-

ration of their employment. Although this is set to expire in 2014, for many already studying within the UK the controls have presented significant ob-stacles to employment. It has also had a negative effect on students looking to work part-time for up to the maximum 20 hours a week in order to support the growing costs of a degree.

In order for a student to obtain a work, they must supply comprehensive documentation. However, the process of confirmation has been plagued by severe inadequacies from within the UKBA, specifically concerning the length of time it takes for students to receive certificates allowing them to work. A number of students have had to wait around six months (the maxi-mum length of time by which the UKBA must return documentation) for their confirmation, with some enduring a wait of more than eighteen months for their application to be processed, in-cluding those who have already gradu-ated and been left without the ability to find gainful employment.

Those awaiting their certificate have not had their initial documentation

Romanian and Bulgarian students hit by work permit delay

Rosannah Jones

The University of Glasgow has scored highly in a recent assessment of sexual health facilities amongst the 23 other Russell Group institutions surveyed. However, there is still room for im-provement according to experts.

Glasgow ranked joint 7th with Queen Mary’s University London and received 5 ‘A’ grades out of 10 core assessment areas. This examination of sexual health facilities was carried out by on-line medical service Dr.Ed.com, pub-lished as a ‘Sexual Health Report Card.’ The DrEd Sexual Health Report Card is the first annual measure of UK univer-sities sexual health facilities.

Glasgow was commended for its strength in such areas as condom and contraceptive availability, the avail-ability and promotion of sexual health information around campus, and for holding special events and testing days.

QMU’s free contraception and sexual health advice stall has been instrumen-tal in allowing Glasgow to succeed in this area. The take-home chlamydia and gonorrhoea kits that have previ-ously been given out to students during SHAG (Sexual Health at Glasgow) week by the Barclay Medical Centre have also been identified as part of the success-ful campaign at the university in con-fronting sexual health issues amongst students.

Jess McGrellis, VP Student Support, said: “It is great to see the University of Glasgow so highly ranked on the sexual health report card. We have a wide range of services across cam-pus, including the SRC Advice Centre, the QMU condom service and an on-campus Medical Centre (to just name

a few), who can offer a wide range of services varying from offering contra-ception to directing students to general information about sexual health, and it great to see that being recognized as a strength at Glasgow University.”

McGrellis continued: “Having said that, there is always more that we can do. Some of the areas where Glasgow University scored particularly low, mainly around the information on the university website, should be easy to solve, and therefore providing more information for students and moving up this league table is a realistic goal for the future.”

Glasgow scored lowly in online in-formation about sexual health and the availability of services catering to those victim to sexual assaults. In the light of recent unfortunate events involv-ing a series of sexual assaults on young women in the West End area, the ab-sence of such services is all the more disappointing.

Dr Spence from the Barclay Medical Centre on campus agreed that devel-oping a better web service through the university would help signpost students to facilities, especially students new to Glasgow. He also spoke of the Barclay Medical Centre’s proposals for an in-creased focus on sexual health services for international students, such as the potential introduction of sexual health classes in a variety of languages.

Dr Spence commented that: “We are aware international students will be coming from various countries and with differing levels of sexual health education. Therefore, we are looking at ways to improve the accessibility of our sexual health facilities for them specifi-cally.”

GU scores high on sexual health facilities

Hannah McNeill

A survey recently conducted by the on-line company Student Beans has shown that students studying at Glasgow Uni-versity have high levels of dissatisfac-tion in the quality of their housing and university-run accommodation. The survey uncovered higher levels of ver-min and lower levels of safety and se-curity than the UK average for students.

Less than half of students surveyed had carbon monoxide detectors in their accommodation. In addition, the percentage of GU students that did not have a smoke detector in their student housing and accommodation was dou-ble the UK average, with 1/5 properties not fulfilling this legal requirement.

The statistics showed that the per-centage of Glasgow University students that had problems with rats in their housing and accommodation was four times the national average for students; with nearly ¼ of GU students having had a problem with them. The average levels of mould were high throughout the UK with ½ of all students having a problem with it. GU students had con-siderably lower levels of mould than the average, with 38% of people en-countering problems with it.

56% of students attending Glasgow University felt that they had been taken advantage of by landlords and estate agents when they were looking for student accommodation. GU students were shown to have more difficulty than the average UK student in getting their deposits back on their last student house: 1/3 did not have their deposit returned to them and a further 29% had difficulty in getting theirs returned, with landlords taking three months or even longer to repay them.

Jess McGrellis, SRC Vice President for student support, was concerned with the results shown. She said: “It is well established that the standard of private rented accommodation around Glasgow leaves a lot to be desired, if anyone is concerned about the stan-dards or safety of their property, they should consider reporting their con-cerns to either the HMO Unit or the landlord registration scheme if the property is not HMO licensed. If it is a repairs issue, then there is an applica-tion process through the Private Rent-ed Housing Panel. Students can come to the SRC advice centre to find out about any of these schemes.”

McGrellis continued on to say: “No properties should have mice, rats or cockroaches which go untreated! In-

festations can be difficult to get rid of completely, but if landlords don’t take any action whatsoever, tenants can complain to the council environmental health section. Unfortunately mould can be a little less straightforward to deal with if there are ventilation prob-lems, which can conflict with keeping a property secure if the only ventilation option available is to open a window. Once again, the SRC advice centre can help with any questions about this.”

Carbon monoxide, colloquially known as the “silent killer”, is an odour-less, colourless gas. It is formed when there is not enough oxygen available during combustion to produce car-bon dioxide. In carbon monoxide poi-soning, it takes the place of oxygen in haemoglobin so that oxygen cannot be carried in the blood. Detectors are rec-ommended for all buildings and are a legal requirement in many countries, including Northern Ireland. Houses in Multiple Occupancy (HMO) licensed properties, that is, properties that have three or more unrelated tenants living together, must have fire doors, extin-guishers and a fire blanket in the kitch-en in addition to the smoke detectors required in all rental accommodation.

Glasgow student accomodation worse than rest of UK

returned to them by the UKBA. Many students have been without passports for more than six months. Others have not had been handed back their Euro-pean Health Insurance Card, meaning they are not entitled to free healthcare in the event of an emergency. Rayna Andreeva, a Bulgarian student at Glasgow, was faced with the choice of either handing over her EHIC or pay-ing over £300 in insurance for one year. She sent away her EHIC along with her official ID card in November and is still awaiting their return.

She said: “As I chose not to pay £300, I risk a lot by walking around without my very important EHIC. What if an accident happens? The card will cover some of the expenses, but since I do not have it with me, I will have to pay the entire sum.”

The experiences of people such as Rayna are not uncommon. She has heard stories of students being without important documentation beyond the six month limit promised by the UKBA. High-profile events such as the Olym-pic games have added even greater de-lays on the processing of applicants.

Rayna also encountered major dif-ficulties when contacting the UKBA. Those who don’t wish to send away original documentation can arrange a meeting at the UKBA’s office in Croy-don, London either by telephone or signing up online to fast track their ap-plication. Rayna attempted this option

only to come up against a highly inef-ficient bureaucracy with huge waiting times and unavailable staff.

Rayna continued: “I have called more than a hundred times sometimes in consecutive days and all the time the phone was busy. It wasn’t easier on-line, either. I registered on the website and when I checked an appointment for the next three months there were none. There are only a few known cases of people who actually managed to get an appointment, and if you consider how many appointments there are supposed to be, a lot more could have gotten through. Therefore, this method does not work for the majority of us, desperately trying to obtain a working licence.”

The outcry has generated a cam-paign to highlight the barriers restrict-ing Bulgarian and Romanian students from gaining the necessary experience both for their degrees and future ca-reers. The campaign for equal student rights for Bulgarian and Romanian stu-dents in the UK have launched a large Facebook group and an e-petition to the Home Office that has attracted al-most 2000 signatures. The campaign is demanding that the restrictions be lifted so that Romanian and Bulgarian students are set the same requirements as students from 191 other nations. As well as highlighting what it describes as the “discriminatory” regulations faced by these students, it is also insisting the

UKBA is overhauled to ensure a much more efficient application process and that original documentation is not withheld from students for any longer than the maximum six month time frame.

Glasgow University Students’ Repre-sentative Council has sign the petition in a bid to help those students affected.

Jessica McGrellis, VP Student Sup-port for the SRC, said: “The process of applying for work permits for Ro-manian and Bulgarian students has proved to be a difficult task. Delays of up to 9 months [for students at GU] have been relayed to the SRC, by which point your application is likely to have expired. This is particularly problem-atic for those students who need to gain paid work experience to complete their degree. This unfair discrimination against these students is the reason the SRC Council agreed to sign the petition calling on equal student work rights for Bulgarian and Romanian students. Be-yond this there seems to be a problem with UKBA resources which is causing the ridiculous amount of time these permits take to be granted, which we hope will be addressed in the future.”

The campaign has achieved partial success in Scotland, with the Univer-sity of Dundee giving a one-off grant of £250 Bulgarian or Romanian students in first year who have applied for a work permit.

CULTURE 12-16NEWS 2-7MARCH 5TH 2013 VIEWS 8-11 SPORT 3NEWS 2-5

Louise Wilson

A recent study has highlighted a rise in “educational inequality” in Britain as the majority of those who go on to study for postgraduate degrees are coming, increasingly, from richer backgrounds.

The study, undertaken by The Sut-ton Trust, found 11% of people now hold postgraduate degrees, equating to 2.1 million people. However, the large majority of these 2.1 million come from the richest 20% of the population, based on family income. The report specifically states that: “the barriers to increased social mobility keep on be-ing perpetuated by the colonisation of higher and higher educational qualifi-cations by individuals from richer fam-ily backgrounds.”

Those from low and middle-income backgrounds tend to not obtain post-graduate degrees, despite the extra £5,500 annual average earnings for those who hold such a qualification. The report went on to criticise the in-crease in undergraduate fees to £9,000 per year, which it believes will only “bolster social immobility” in the com-ing years.

The study recommends that a state-backed loan scheme, similar to that available for undergraduates, should be set up to support those from low or middle-income backgrounds who wish to go into postgraduate study.

The study also called for close review of how the increased undergraduate fees affect the numbers of those going into postgraduate study, and ensure univer-sities accept students from a variety of backgrounds onto their postgraduate courses.

The University of Glasgow offers some assistance for those who wish to continue their studies to postgraduate level, as well as a number of scholar-ships. The Scottish Funding Council (SFC) also recently announced that an additional 122 postgraduate places at Glasgow will be supported. A Univer-sity spokesperson said: “The University of Glasgow has a long-standing com-mitment to the principle of widening access to higher education and this is borne out by statistics.”

The spokesperson continued: “Our research suggests that undergraduate students from deprived backgrounds do just as well as those from other ar-eas in their studies and are therefore as well prepared to advance to postgradu-ate level should they wish to do so. The University of Glasgow does provide postgraduate scholarships and assis-tance to students in applying for exter-nal sources of funding.”

The additional of the extra 122 post-graduate places is the largest in Scot-land, with the SFC funding 850 taught postgraduate students across 18 Scot-tish universities.

Post-grad degrees “go against improved social mobility”

72% of SRC positions uncontested or unfilledLouise Wilson

72% of representative positions on the SRC have, in the upcoming elec-tions, gone uncontested or will remain vacant in the lowest amount of nomi-nated students since 2009.

Two of the uncontested positions are for the paid sabbatical roles of SRC President and Vice President (Student Support), which in all likelihood will be filled by Jess McGrellis, current VPSS, and Louise Graham respectively. VP (Education) and VP (Student Activi-ties), the new roles replacing VP (Me-dia & Communications), have received three candidates each.

The past three years have seen all four sabbatical positions contested, with last year’s elections seeing four-teen candidates running for the four total available positions. However, this year is still higher the the 2009 elections which saw SRC President uncontested, and VP (Media & Communications) not receiving any nomination for the position.

Only half of the Welfare & Equal Op-portunities Officer positions will be contested this year; next year’s Gender Equality Officer will likely be Clopin Meehan, President of the Feminist So-ciety, whilst the Charities, Clubs & So-cieties Officer position will probably go to Gintare Masiulyte. Race Equality Of-ficer and Age Equality Officer received no nominations.

Of the four College Convenor posi-tions, three are uncontested and the position of Medical, Veterinary and Life Science Convenor is vacant. Four of the five Postgraduate Convenors also re-main vacant, with only Lorna Macbean running for PG Convenor of Arts. Nine of the School Representative positions are also vacant, whilst four are uncon-

tested. James Harrison, current President

of the SRC, was pleased that some of the School Representative and Wel-fare Officer positions were being con-tested. He said: “In Spring 2011 only 2 school rep positions were contested, compared to 5 contested positions this year. As the Autumn elections hit we usually have lots of students putting themselves forward to fill the remain-ing places, so I’m confident most posi-tions will be filled in October.

He continued: “It’s a shame that a few of the sabbatical positions are not contested. We know of several students who had intended to submit nomina-tion forms, but decided not to shortly before the deadline, due to reasons in-cluding study and employment oppor-tunities elsewhere. Also, the fact that a few campaigns seemed to have begun before nominations closed, may have had an impact in putting off potential challengers. In addition to this, there’s been a lot less controversy and division on campus this year than in previous years, so the desire for many people to put themselves forward doesn’t seem to have been as strong this year.”

Donald Mackay, a General Repre-sentative for the SRC, expressed dis-appointment over the low number of nominations. He said: “Low takeup of positions on the SRC is always disap-pointing. I call on the newly elected sabbaticals to do everything possible to ensure the positions are filled in the October by-elections, because with-out positions filled on the Council at School level and other roles, it be-comes increasingly difficult to engage students in what the SRC can do.”

The low number of nominations for positions suggests students are either apathetic towards or even misunder-stand the importance of the SRC in

shaping student life.

Steph Baross, a first year Chemistry student, explained she feels uncon-nected to the SRC. She said: “I know absolutely nothing about it, other than there are elections. All I’ve really been told about it are a couple of emails that I, and I assume most other people, have just skipped past. But we haven’t had anyone in lectures to tell us about it, like we do for every other thing that happens, and we haven’t been told about what positions there are. So I think most first years have just as-sumed it’s nothing relevant to us.”

Emily Wheeler, a third year English Language student, feels the SRC needs to be much more personal to increase engagement. She said: “I think the SRC is useful and a brilliant thing when it works. However it’s just that - The SRC. I don’t think anyone not directly in-volved with it actually knows who any-one within the SRC is, and that means that the elections just come off as some sort of popularity contest - who’s got the most flyers and the brightest tshirts? I’ve never voted because I’ve never understood the point - to me anyone who’s got the guts and integrity to stand for a position will probably do a good job, and how much is the views of one person going to change the way the university is run? I think we need better representation of the individuals within the SRC, what it is they do, and how it’s useful and connected to our experience of university.”

More students had been rumoured to be running for various positions on the SRC prior to nominations closing. These potential candidates pulled out of the contest for reasons unknown.

Louise Wilson

Calum MacInnes beat opposition James Ansell for the QM President po-sition for next year, with a narrow vic-tory of just 13 votes.

Overall turnout for the QM elections was 476 votes, around 12% of those who hold memberships to the Union. Thirteen of these votes were submitted online by absentee voters. MacInnes passed the quota needed to be elected by 3 votes, winning 235 votes overall.

Opposition candidate Ansell had re-mained the favourite in the run-up to the election, held Thursday 28th Feb-ruary, though MacInnes performed at the Presidential Debate better on the Wednesday before.

MacInnes was delighted with his victory, saying: “I think the hard work James and I put into the election cam-paign helped demonstrate the consid-erable potential the QMU has in the year ahead. I feel very privileged to have been elected and look forward to taking the opportunity to fulfil that po-tential.”

For the year ahead, MacInnes has promised to focus on making sure Uni-versity management see the Union as

an important part of campus and the student experience, in light of the £67k block grant being withheld at the start of the year.

MacInnes has promised renovation of the bar areas, a push to get adver-tising for in-house magazine QMuni-cate and to get more students into the Union over the next year.

Outgoing President Colum Fraser was pleased with the turnout received in the elections, stating he: “expected a lower turnout due to the frankly disap-pointing level of contest seen this year.”

Fraser continued: “The next couple of months will involve a lot of training by the current Executive, but we are looking forward to working with the in-coming to see what we can achieve go-ing forward. The current Executive will now be setting their sights on larger, more fundamental developments to the processes and structures within the Union in the next few months, projects that we hope the new Executive - and many in the future - can either contin-ue or benefit from.”

Emma Jewson was elected into the position of Honorary Secretary, and Sean McFadden elected to Honorary Assistant Secretary.

MacInnes narrowly wins QMU election


SRC SPRING ELECTIONS 2013VP EDUCATION

Coombs has no experience within the SRC, but as President of the Swimming & Waterpolo Club and co-founder of the Food Co-Op he has a clear knowledge of how the SRC functions and is well-liked among students. His manifesto leans towards more involvement between the SRC and societies, helping Fresher’s through their first year and ensuring financial cutbacks at the University do not adversely affect the student experi-ence. In three words, he describes his focus as: “reaching to students”.

Oli Coombs

Johnstone is the only candidate running for this position that has worked within the SRC before, this year filling the role of College Convenor for Social Sciences. Her manifesto focuses on improving academic facilities for students and improving the connections be-tween Student Representatives, the SRC and University management. In three words, Johnstone de-scribes her focus as: “quality, policy and engagement”.

Lucy Johnstone

Guardian: You mention in your man-ifesto that you will work to improve campus facilities. How will you seek to do so, and what do you feel in particu-lar needs improving?

Johnstone: At the minute I think there’s a lot of on-campus facilities, like libraries for subjects, for example the Law School has a law workshop which has all kinds of resources different from the main library, and I think some of these computer clusters and extra sub-ject libraries are maybe not utilised as best at they could be.

As VP Education I’d be sitting on the Libraries Committee so I’d have quite a strong voice on that to shape policy and I know the library are very flexible and willing to change things that aren’t working. For example postgraduates, who now have their own space in the library to work in the computer cluster.

I think it’s a case of working with the library to really encourage the best use of the space we have. At the minute we have an overcrowding problem quite a lot of the time and with dissertations being handed in at the minute it’s quite bad, and it’s really just seeking to sort of get solutions to the problems that we have at the minute. I think we need to be working very closely with the library to make sure other problems are ad-dressed.

Guardian: You also refer to poor treatment of student representatives. How will you improve this treatment and open up the possibility of getting constructive feedback?

Johnstone: What happened this year was Social Sciences sent out an email asking students in the college to put themselves forward for committees, which basically undermines the work the SRC does and the fact that we have elected representatives on the council.

I’d like to see that representatives are treated fairly across all the schools and that they’re systematic and not just sending emails out saying ‘put yourself forward for committee’, because you have no idea how these representatives are being chosen, you know. It’s not re-ally fair.

I will improve this through more meetings. This year has not been as good as I’d like. We’ve had one Col-lege Convenor meeting, which I just don’t think is good enough. I’ve always said I’m available for the meetings. We didn’t have one at all in first semester when obviously a lot of the problems are arising and I’m somebody who would like to build a good working re-lationship with the College Convenors. I will set up regular meetings that have to be attended.

Engagement is really difficult, it comes up year in and year out in mani-festos and yet it is the hardest thing in the world to do because students hate surveys, they hate getting so many emails and some students just won’t be interested at the end of the day. Getting students really engaged comes from, for example, training class represen-tatives well. I attended a session last

Guardian: How would the Buddy system you propose work?

Coombs: I think the details of it need to be worked out, I’ve just put the idea out there in my manifesto. I don’t think it’d be one-to-one, I don’t know if that could work, but there should be a pool of older students which younger stu-dents could turn to. Obviously it’s got to be tailored within your course, within your department, so that you’re speak-ing to someone that’s done the same things as you. The details do need to be worked out but the intention is clear, so that there is more assistance from older students helping younger students, not just in Fresher’s week but throughout their university career. From my per-sonal experience, doing my disserta-tion which I’ve just handed in, luckily I spoke to students who are older than me - and that was hugely helpful. I can get all the help I want from tutors and staff in my department but having a student that has gone through it recent-ly to speak to is massively beneficial.

Guardian: How do you feel students would get ‘better value for money’?

Coombs: In terms of teaching, just ensuring you’re getting regular face-to-face classes and small tutor groups, so you’re not being lumped in with 30 or 40 other people in the seminar. Small lectures as well, being able to feel that you can approach your tutors when you want. Obviously as a fee paying student

that affects me more than people com-ing from Scotland, but it’s still impor-tant. Going to university should be an experience and it should be something you get a lot out of. My whole idea is putting the student first and having learning at the forefront.

Guardian: You put a heavy emphasis on the importance of student clubs & societies, though this isn’t strictly the remit of VP Education. Why do you feel societies are so important?

Coombs: What I meant by that is in terms of the way the Psychology So-ciety works and the Geography Soci-ety works, and they have really close links with their departments. Those sorts of societies can massively help in your learning experience, especially if they’re putting on weekly talks and the department get really involved. The philosophy society is a small but excel-lent example. Lots of lecturers come down to that and as a year you might go to reading parties.

So those are the sorts of societies that I felt that VP Education should foster and encourage close links with the department, as oppose to the Wa-ter Polo Club which is hugely valuable but I know that’s out of the remit of VP Education. It’s difficult to make that ex-plicit in my manifesto, but that’s what I mean.

A society doesn’t have to cater to everyone who is interested in going to some parts of it and there’s parts of it that can be enormously beneficial to the education side of things which not everyone needs to get involved in. And just because I want societies to be able to do that doesn’t mean they should ignore the interesting talks and the in-teresting social functions that they also serve.

The History Society is lacking, it doesn’t organise these big talks, it doesn’t organise help for dissertations and what not, so the buddy system and the society thing can all work together and improve the university.

How will you connect with Student Representatives and College Conve-nors?

Coombs: I think I just need to open access and open corridors of commu-nication and make sure there’s intro-ductions happening. If elected I would obviously be working for the SRC but I want to make sure that we’re all going towards to same goal of enhancing the learning experience of the university.

I think there are excellent procedures put in place, but I think they’re not used enough. I think that there needs to be a broadening of the SRC that appeals, so that people really realise what it’s about, people know who their class representatives are, people can really go to their class representatives as their first port of call, and then from there take it up to us on the SRC.

I also feel it’s got to start from the top as well. Executives need to be ap-proachable and if a student has got something, anything wrong, they can come up to the executives office and

they can talk to us about it and we’ll try and find a solution or pass them on to someone who’s an expert. So there are excellent mechanisms in place they just need to be used a lot better.

Guardian: How would you like to see the development of the Western Infirmary site go, as alluded to in your manifesto?

Coombs: That’s been rumoured about since I first came to university - it’s been a long time coming, and the last few weeks have just been confirma-tion of that. I think the wonderful build-ings that we have around the university, like all the tenement houses, are excel-lent, but they’re probably getting too old. I want the university to make sure that it keeps the student at the forefront of it’s policies. And I think moving part of the university to the Western Infir-mary is an excellent opportunity and something that the SRC must make sure they play a big role in.

I would also say that with the big projects recently, such as MyCampus and purchasing the Hive, there has been a serious lack of consultation on behalf of the university. With this next new big project I’d like consultation to be put first to make sure that the stu-dents know what’s going on, most im-portantly, and secondly if they disagree with it there’s adequate space for them to get their disagreements heard.

week and it was actually very good, it talks a lot about reflection and how class representatives can make a huge difference, representing thousands at the University. Trying to encourage en-gagement starts from meeting straight away with College Convenors, meeting with School Reps, because if you’re not meeting with them, are they going to be meeting with their own class reps? I think it’s a chain.

Guardian: What would you like to see be done with the redevelopment of the Western Infirmary site recently ac-quired by the University, as mentioned in your manifesto?

Johnstone: I would like to see really good lecture theatres. I think there’s a lot of scope for some really brilliant big lecture theatres, because at the minute I think there’s only 5 or 6 large ones that have the capacity for 200 or more students. I’d like to see lecture record-ing materials build in them. I think that the university is putting emphasis on lecture recording and to install the equipment needed to do it, because obviously it can be quite expensive and staff need to be trained. I’d really like to see a modern campus, so our campus is sustainable for the next few years and that it doesn’t seem archaic.

Guardian: Specifically, you hope to increase the amount of lectures being recorded. How will you address staff fears that this would reduce the num-bers attending lectures, and persuade them to allow this?

Johnstone: This was discussed at the Learning and Teaching Committee that I sit on. It was discussed in November and it was actually found that in a lot of universities, such as Leeds, recordings encourage more students turn up. At the end of the day I think students learn best when they’re in the environment with the lecturer, and they can see and interact with them. There’s students that just won’t go to lectures at all, but you can’t change that if it’s recorded or not. I don’t think attendance will drop that much to be honest. I think it’s in-credibly important to the subjects that do have too many students, that can’t fit in the room, that they will have the recorded lecture.

Guardian: Anything else to add?Johnstone: It’s an interesting year,

I think, because Fresher’s Week is no longer the responsibility of VP Educa-tion, whereas in the past VP Learn-ing & Development would always, the minute they got into the job, organise Fresher’s Week and then shoot straight in. I think it’ll give me time to develop policy, work with the learning & teach-ing centre. I probably will have a bit more time on my hands, I don’t think personally it’ll be the busiest of jobs, therefore we’re going to have time to really encourage hard work towards developing policy.

VP (Education) oversees the academic areas of students, through regular meetings with School Reps and College Convenors. VP-Ed is in charge of all academic representation, bringing any issues with various colleges to the attention of University management, as well as targeting education problems at the national level.

CULTURE 12-16MARCH 5TH 2013 SPORT 5NEWS 2-7 VIEWS 8-11

SRC SPRING ELECTIONS 2013

Paris has no experience within the SRC, but his involvement with SNP Students as National Conve-nor has meant he is well-known across campus. His manifesto is shaped by his political ideologies, particular in light of fees and creat-ing a more democratic relationship between students and University management. In three words, Paris describes his focus as: “education for all”.

Dan Paris

Guardian: Your campaign and mani-festo is much more politically focuses that the other candidates. Why have

you chosen this specific focus?Paris: I think there’s a bit of an issue

with the way the SRC is seen by a lot of people, which leads to quite a lot of disillusionment. I think we can see that from the fact that some positions are uncontested. It’s almost as if we’re just picking between bureaucrats, whereas I think if we’re going to have an SRC, if we’re going to pay people to represent students, we should be taking position on wider issues. I think that the SRC can actually play a useful role if we do that, especially when you consider we’re a non-NUS university, there’s ac-tually a real need for the SRC to do that. I wouldn’t say it’s necessarily a political manifesto, but it is taking a stance on policies, which I think is an important thing to do because the role is partially to do with influencing decisions taken through the year, but it’s also to do with education policies on a national level.

Guardian: You also mention the Fair Access in the Legal Profession cam-paign, which has already been cam-paigned for but didn’t get out of the water. How do you plan to do things differently?

Paris: It’s an important campaign and it’s not an easy campaign to win, and I’m under no illusions about that. But I think that student representa-tives should be taking on these sorts of issues. It’s not actually that difficult initially to solve, there are several so-lutions for this. I think the SRC should get really involved with the campaign, to put pressure on the university to support it, and to put pressure on the government to support it. Glasgow SRC

shouldn’t have to campaign by itself, but as part of a wider campaign and movement. It can actually, I think, be a successful campaign. I think it’s really important as well because law has got this reputation of it being a very mid-dle-class profession, and all the people going to the same schools working for the same people that their dad knew, and no other profession has the bound-aries, the barriers, that law does. It’s a practical and a moral issue, it’s some-thing that needs to be tackled.

Guardian: Can you tell me a bit more about how you plan to build on the schemes for wider access?

Paris: Glasgow have actually done some really good stuff on widening ac-cess and the fact that there’s 800 places going to be funded over the next 4 years is a good step forward, but it’s some-thing that I think we can always work better on. It is not necessarily provid-ing spaces specifically for people from deprived backgrounds, but helping them getting there in the first places and helping them to retain them. Now summer school is something which has been proven to be effective in doing that, it’s the one thing that I think we should have a real focus on and try to set a target to increase take-up.

The other thing that I propose is having a mentoring scheme, which links prospective applicants with exist-ing students. We should just make it a lot easier for them to understand the basic stuff like how to fill in applica-tions, what you could be doing to put in your personal statements before you get here, but also what is univer-

sity like before you get here, what is the workload like, how is it different from school. These sorts of things can really help people when they’re applying and when they get here. It’s also something that can be advantageous for students to take part in it, it’d be really worth the experience. It’s something that would make them more employable in the fu-ture, once you’ve done that sort of vol-unteering work.

Guardian: You mention wanting to work towards a more democratic struc-ture for the running of the University - what about the existing structure do you believe is undemocratic and how do you plan to target this?

Paris: The governance review is be-ing discussed in Scottish parliament right now, and that was a really inter-esting report we’ve done that how the university court and senate structure could be more democratic, and have more of an input from staff and stu-dents. That’s something that can be done at the national level and it’s some-thing the universities are quite resistant to. I think we need to really strongly indicate to the university that it’s not something that they should accept be-grudgingly, but engage with to the best of their ability.

I think there’s been a bit of an issue where there’s been a move towards a lot of business interest - which is fine to have, there is a relevance there to see how university should be run, but university should be primarily about learning. I think the best people to make those kinds of decisions are the staff and students here.

Guardian: How will the involvement with School Representatives and Col-lege Convenors be improved in order to, as you state in your manifesto, shape the SRC’s agenda?

Paris: The key thing here is just to make sure that the basics are done, in terms of having regular meetings and actually following stuff up, and ensur-ing that concerns are taken to the levels that are necessary. To be honest, I think it’s just something that anyone who gets into the job should be capable of doing. It’s part of the job, an important part of the job, and I don’t want to downplay it, but it’s something that should just be expected to be done and I think that if the VP Education isn’t doing that then that’s up for the rest of the SRC to really take issue with.

Guardian: What would you like to see for the redevelopment of the Western Infirmary site?

Paris: It’s really good to see the uni-versity moving forward, and in the cur-rent financial climates that it’s trying to expand in terms of the services we offer. I think the important thing is just that there’s as strong a student and staff influence into the process as possible.The SRC should be shaping that pro-cess, the consultation period should be as widely engaged with, with the actual entire population. It should be about what do they want to see, rather than what people in the SRC want to see, what university management want to see.

PRESIDENT

Jess McGrellis is the current SRC VP Student Support. Prior to her year as a sabbatical officer she was President of Glasgow University Lesbian, Gay, Bisexusal and Trans-gender Student’s Association. Oli-ver Milne spoke to the Presidential candidate, who is standing unop-posed.

Jess McGrellis Guardian: You’ve listed amongst your achievements the University debt policy, begun under your predecessor, what positive changes has this brought about to students at Glasgow?

McGrellis: The changes to the debt policy have been crucial. When regis-tration opens (usually around August) most students won’t have received any student funding for months and therefore it’s not surprising that some students may be saddled with a bit of debt they can’t repay until after they re-ceive their September funding. We are not talking about students with huge amounts of debt, this is for students who have debt up to £250 which they can’t repay just yet. If you are a student in a competitive course and enrolment opens on the 1st of August, by the time you are able to register you have lost the opportunity to take the courses you want to take. No student should be disadvantaged like that because they have found themselves in financial hardship. This has been particularly crucial this year as the university finan-cial team (or maybe it’s a mycampus screw up - I don’t think even they know who’s responsible) have continued to accuse students of having debt that they don’t have. The examples of this are significant. It’s bad enough not be-ing able to enrol on your courses when

you actually are stranded with debt that you can’t pay, even worse when you’re being accused of having debt that you don’t actually have.

Guardian: Your manifesto described this welfare week as the ‘most success-ful and engaging in recent history’ what barometers were used to measure its success or does that just sound good in a manifesto? Do you feel its even-tual success was harmed in anyway by the initial controversy over ‘positivity week’?

McGrellis: Compared to previous years, the events we had during Welfare Week 2012 were very well turned out. The events also got positive responses in the feedback forms. It’s difficult to know the effect the initial naming of Positivity Week had on Welfare Week. The publicity helped to raise aware-ness of the week, not just to those who disagreed with the concept of Positivity Week but also to those who were inter-ested in the concept. It also allowed me to work directly with a number of stu-dents who had disagreed with Positiv-ity Week and help promote the kinds of events they wanted to see instead.

Guardian: Changes to Border regu-lations have caused chaos within the University. Guardian has heard from countless students about stress it has caused them. Have you or the SRC done enough? What concretely will you

seek to do as President? McGrellis: The SRC are facilitating a

number of focus groups coming up in the middle of March with Tier 4 stu-dents. I’m going to shamelessly use this as an opportunity to promote these fo-cus groups, please come along if you’re a Tier 4 student who has anything to feedback about this issue (information will be published on the SRC Facebook soon so stay tuned). We need to know more about what students want before we take action. The current situation is that there is not a unified approach to this across colleges and I suspect that the method for student check-ins used in certain colleges is better than oth-ers, but we need to hear this from the students before I take it to the univer-sity UKBA project group. I’m happy to answer any questions or hear any feed-back about this via email.

As President, I will ensure that this situation is continued to be monitored, working directly with the VP Student Support in their role on the university project group. Furthermore I will con-tinue to watch the national situation with regards to changes in UKBA. Mo-mentum is building as displeasure to-wards UKBA continues to grow. This is not something that Glasgow University can do on its own and we need that na-tional momentum to continue to grow in order for us to take further action

which I would do if the opportunity arose. Whether in the form of a protest, petition or however it may present.

Guardian: You’ve mentioned the Rector election in your manifesto. What is your perception on the current rec-tor? Would you agree with this anony-mous assessment made by a senior member of University staff: “Charles is at best a part time rector, at worst he is negligent and a hindrance to good gov-ernance”

McGrellis: I feel uncomfortable an-swering this question when my under-standing is that Charles is currently in the midst of difficult personal circum-stances. Having said this, it’s really important that we have a rector that is present on campus and therefore I will encourage a number of candidates to stand in the upcoming election so that our students have a good choice for rector.

Guardian: You also talk about the website and communication in your manifesto. This is basically an SRC elec-tion trope, mentioned by every candi-date in nearly every election. Why are you the candidate who can finally make a difference to what is clearly a problem area?

McGrellis: The process of imple-menting a new website has already begun so it’s not a case of this being something that won’t be delivered.

President is the most senior executive role, in charge of making sure the SRC is running as it should be. The President sits on University Court and Senate, as well as various other committees, to en-sure the voices of students are heard. The President must also represent students at the national level, coordinating with external educational bodies.

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VP STUDENT SUPPORT

Guardian: In your manifesto you spoke about your experiences on the GUU Board of Management, what skills acquired as part of a Union board, or more specifically as Games Convenor, do you feel carry over to the role of VPSS?

Graham: The most prominent skill I have developed as part of the board is time management. Every day is differ-ent in the role of VPSS so I believe be-ing organised is key. This means I will always have time for unexpected work, which is common in the role. Further, I now have two years of experience in organising large scale events which I can apply to the organisation of RAG week and Welfare week. Finally, work-ing in a team to achieve goals on board will transfer to the close work I would

like to do with the Welfare and Equal Opportunities Officers, engaging them to a higher level than in previous years.

Guardian: As Games Convenor what’s been your relationship with stu-dent support and welfare issues?

Graham: My role as Games Conve-ner doesn’t touch upon support and welfare issues directly but gives me an opportunity to interact with a wide range of students frequently. The posi-tion on board however, has been an op-portunity for me to become involved in areas of student support and welfare at the university such as GUSA Sport and Wellbeing Week and the Mental Health Agreements Working Group which has given me an opportunity to contribute to improvement in this area.

Guardian: You’ve talked about your experiences working around mental health. What are biggest problems with the University’s mental health support and what - in an era of declining stu-dent support budgets - can be done to improve this vital support service?

Graham: It seems to be the same problem over the years - we always need more resources for mental health services in order to reduce waiting times and provide a larger variety of help. Being a student is a stressful time and it’s a real shame when people can’t get support they need.

In this time where money is tight, I am however, very positive about the Mental Health Agreements Working Group. Rather than spending more money on resources, the initiative aims to promote a university wide focus on streamlining the university services through all student services and bod-ies working together. Every service and body has something to contrib-ute to improving student welfare and this group will ensure every penny we have is spent wisely. This will guarantee there is no overlap in services provided and we will encourage every student body to contribute to improving mental health in the university in any way they can. An example of this is the crossover between GUSA Sport and Wellbeing week and Welfare week. Good com-munication with the Welfare Convener

of GUSA will mean that both Welfare Week and Sport and Wellbeing week can offer a variety of different services to students and guarantee we are not spending twice. Promoting self-help strategies through these campaigns will hopefully give students the resources they need to improve well being, or at least enough help to keep them going until they can receive the professional help they need.

Guardian: You’ve talked about Strathclyde Police. Currently Strathclyde Police and Glasgow City Council are discussing plans to put a uniformed support officer on every campus within Glasgow. Would you support this proposal?

Graham: What would you say to stu-dents uncomfortable with the idea of active police presence on campus? I think this proposal is a fantastic way to deter criminals from campus and may reduce the amount of crime however, I can sympathise with those uncom-fortable with the idea. The recent at-tacks on campus are concerning and I think it is important for all students to feel safe walking around campus; the uniformed support officer would be one way to achieve this. However, at Glasgow we are lucky to have campus security on duty 24 hours a day. Howev-er, I believe that another way to reduce crime on campus effectively would be to reduce the opportunity for crime. To do this, I would like to emphasize ways for students to keep themselves and their belongings safe through campaigns in emails and social media from the SRC and the unions, building upon the campaigns this year. Further, I would like the police safety training of Freshers Helpers to be more detailed so that these representatives can pass bet-ter, more useful information on to new students to Glasgow.

Guardian: What would be your aims to ensure higher levels of support and campus involvement amongst interna-tional students?

Graham: I plan to work closely with International Student Support Ser-vices and the International Students Officer to build upon and support the

work they already do. The support pro-vided for international students such as support with VISA applications, im-migration and support with settling into Scotland are important for inter-national student retention. As well as university support, I would like to work with the unions in increasing events for international students. Language cafés, international fairs and international-theme club nights are well attended and provide good social opportunities for international students. Through events such as these, there should hopefully be increased involvement from international students. Changes in UKBA monitoring procedures have caused problems within the University, what would you do to ensure that these monitoring procedures don’t disrupt the learning or welfare of international students? Working with the university closely on the new regulations will be the most effective way to prevent dis-turbance. Smoothing out the system for monitoring international students should keep disruption to a minimum as well as working closely with schools with a high number of international students such as the business school. Using the student card scanners al-ready used in classes which are used to monitor all students is a way to achieve this, preventing international students being singled out.

Guardian: What is the biggest chal-lenge facing students in the coming year?

Graham: Students put themselves under a tremendous amount of pres-sure at university. With the state of the economy - the number of graduate jobs decreasing and university fees increas-ing, there is more pressure than ever before.

Students are trying to achieve a de-gree whilst undertaking the lengthy process of graduate job applications – all to pay off the debt they have built up to come to university. Extracurricular activities are more important than ever in setting themselves apart from the crowd but this is also a time consuming activity. The SRC can help in this in-stance through the services it provides

such as the Advice Centre and the Vol-unteering Service.

Guardian: The role of VPSS is a large, some would say unwieldy, one. What will be your priorities?

Graham: I believe the new sabbatical structure this year means that there is a new focus on welfare for VPSS. With VPSA taking over clubs and societies, VPSS now has more time to focus on vulnerable students. My priorities are: improvements in mental health policy, strong representation from Welfare and Equal Opportunities Officers and cam-pus safety.

Guardian: Finally, are you disap-pointed with the number of candidates running in this election and do you think running unopposed is detrimen-tal to student involvement with student politics and the SRC?

Graham: I am disappointed in the number of candidates standing for election over the whole campus. Run-ning unopposed for a sabbatical posi-tion is almost unheard of but I believe that students are more likely to stand when there has been controversy in the previous year. This year has been relatively quiet compared to the recent history of the SRC however, I am dis-appointed that with so many exciting changes happening over campus such as the campus master plan and the GUU/Stevenson extension, that stu-dents aren’t jumping at the chance to be part of the decision making in shap-ing the future of Glasgow University.

I would hope that the number of unopposed positions will not be detri-mental to involvement in future years. The SRC council this coming year will have their work cut out in promoting involvement and what good it can do for you regarding experience and set-ting yourself apart from other gradu-ates. On the other hand, I am encour-aged to see the variety of students from different experiences and student bod-ies we have running for council this year and hope that this will encourage involvement from more students over the whole campus in years to come.

Louise Graham is the current Games Convenor at the Glasgow University Union and has a back-ground in mental health outreach. Oliver Milne spoke to the candidate for Vice President Student Support who is standing unopposed.

Louise Graham

The role of VP (Student Support) is to look after the welfare of all students across the University. VPSS must deal with various issues of students, including financing, mental health and accommodation problems. VPSS regularly liaises with the Advice Centre, International Office and other University services.

What I need to do is oversee this pro-cess and make sure we end up with a tool that allows us to communicate in ways we can’t on our current, very old website such as embedding videos and sound that will give us another method of communication.

Guardian: You talk about the Glasgow Students forum and represen-tation at a national level. The last NUS referendum was held in 2006. Is it time for another? Do you believe we should be a member of the NUS? If not, why not?

McGrellis: While seven years is a long time it’s worth remembering that in the last NUS referendum the results were 93.9% against membership. While I am not against the idea of another referen-dum to confirm the student opinion, I don’t think having this referendum in a year which already has a rector elec-

tion is a good idea. It would be better to have it in a year where more resources and time can be put into making sure that a real debate on this matter can be had. I think it’s important that an SRC President remain neutral on the matter of NUS membership, to be able to facil-itate debate on an unbiased platform.

Guardian: Should the SRC introduce active liberation caucuses on Campus for each of the welfare groups as is done at EUSA?

McGrellis: This is certainly not some-thing I would be opposed to. I guess the question is whether we actually need it. We already have an active LGBT Society and a Feminist Society who already perform the work that libera-tion caucuses would. We have a Mature Students’ Association who represent the needs of their members and a large number of faith based societies who do

the same. Our Welfare Officers already liaise closely with these groups and that is a really crucial part of their job which I think could be encouraged further. I think we could build on this structure and these relationships without dupli-cating something that already exists just in a different form.

Guardian: Why, in your assessment, has this election attracted such low in-terest with 72% of the positions either unfilled or uncontested? Is the SRC experiencing a crisis of legitimacy with the student body? How as president would try to improve democratic en-gagement?

McGrellis: I don’t think it’s got any-thing to do with the SRC experiencing any crisis of legitimacy. Bear in mind only 5 months ago the SRC had its highest ever turnout for an Autumn election, with a large amount of can-

didates! This Spring we had a number of students express interest in running and then decide not to for various dif-ferent reasons. The interest is definitely there we just need to encourage stu-dents to take that last step and hand in their forms. I’ve met a number of people who’ve said they didn’t run for certain positions because they thought they were too inexperienced. Therefore I want to make sure that we are being encouraging to remove this self doubt from students that would be very ca-pable in a position on the SRC. It’s also important that we are reiterating that the executive are there to support any-body that gets on Council and there is training to build on your abilities.Af-ter controversial years since 2009 with cuts, an occupation and the resignation of Stuart Ritchie it’s no surprise we are having a quieter year. I am confident

that we’ll fill a lot more positions in the Autumn after a big promotional push to encourage students to run.

Guardian: Do you think running un-opposed will hurt your legitimacy in the coming year?

McGrellis: I ran because I’m passion-ate about this role, representing stu-dents and because I believe I’m suited to this position. My strong record over the past year shows how ready I am for the role. I am disappointed others didn’t decide to put their hat into the ring, however on the election days I will still campaign and try to chat with as many students as possible. I hope in future we will go back to the heav-ily contested Presidential elections as we have seen in the past few years, and I’ll do my best to encourage as many people as possible to run.

CULTURE 12-16MARCH 5TH 2013 VIEWS 8-11 SPORT 7NEWS 2-5 VIEWS 6-11


Recently created VP (Student Activities) is in charge of volunteering opportunities and helping student employability after graduation. VPSA also has the liase with clubs & societies, as well as student media, ensuring no problems arise and overseeing funding, affiliations and inter-society relations. VPSA is also be in charge of organising Freshers’ Week.

VP STUDENT ACTIVITIES

Bobby Rae

Breffni O’Connor

Mark Edge Guardian: Why are you running for VP Activities and what would you bring to the role over the other candidates?

Edge: I can get Freshers’ Week pumping, and I can promise Glasgow’s will be the best RAG week in the UK. RAG week is potentially not in my re-mit, it will probably be Media Week, but I have been part of the debating society and am very eloquent and good with words therefore I’m sure I’ll manage to support the Media Week in many ways. I have a lot of contacts and friends who I’m sure would be able to help.

Guardian: What experience do you have of student media?

Edge: I’m communicator and PR for Salsa for Water. I have been flyering and writing and suggesting logos for Salsa for Water too. I have a very open personality and can communicate in an energetic way. I was a class rep for my marketing class in first year which was also good experience. I’m very interested in reading the campus pub-lications and I will make time to do that if I’m VP Activities.

Guardian: What do you think of the new role?

Edge: Well, I think a lot is still be-ing finalised. I think we should take a more creative approach to things such

as graduate attributes, for example we should use poetry contests. These are skills I believe employers are look-ing for and we should encourage this. Competitions are a great test and po-etry tests develop acting skills and con-fidence. You need students to be pre-pared to compete because they’ll have to compete for a job.

Guardian: What do you think are your chances of winning compared to the other candidates?

Edge: Well I’ve had an international experience of Glasgow University and I’m good at organising events. Ever since I was two years old I’ve been on

a horse in charge of organising a play-ground of children who wanted to play games where I grew up in Spain, and because of these experiences that is why my Freshers’ Week will be the best Freshers’ Week.

If I won, I would use my qualities as a handsome young fit smart man to call up big companies and get merchandis-ing for Freshers’ Week. I’m not sure if this can be part of my job yet though I will say that I will try to get more com-panies interested in GU.

Guardian: Why do you want to be VP Student Activities?

O’Connor: I would love to be elected

as your VP Student Activities because I want to represent all students in a role which I believe I am the best candidate for. Every aspect of this remit is one where I know I can give the best pos-sible representation to fellow students. I’ve previously experienced two Fresh-ers’ Weeks, one as a helper and on on the Board Of Management at GUU, so realise the hard work and long hours required for the week to be a success both in the months previous to it and throughout the week itself. I’ve worked with all four student bodies and feel I have the skills to further improve cross campus relations. I have a wide range of skills which can only be of benefit to this position and love working as part of a team to improve the student ex-perience, which is what this role is all about.

Guardian: What do you think your chances are of winning?

O’Connor: Last year I ran a very suc-cessful campaign, therefore if I can re-late my message across to the student body as clearly this year and prove to them that I am a skilled and promis-

ing candidate then my chances of at-taining the position are strong. Having been involved in all four student bodies throughout my university career and having been an active member of many different clubs and societies I feel that I have established a solid base of support for my campaign and my ideas.

Guardian: What do you have over the other candidates?

O’Connor: I have experience in all aspects of student life, especially those that are related to the role of VP Activi-ties. I am hardworking and dedicated to my work duties and will bring a vi-brancy to the role as I have done in pre-vious positions held. I have built up an enviable network of contacts which I think would be hard to beat. I believe that my previous track record in posi-tions of responsibility is clear evidence of what I would be able to achieve for you if elected.

Guardian: What do you think of the new position?

O’Connor: The candidate elected into this new role will have the fantastic opportunity of concentrating their time

and effort into important aspects of stu-dent life that have not previously been of focus. With the movement of Fresh-ers Week from VP Education to VP Ac-tivities this encourages an integration with the other remits of the job such as student media, clubs and societies and volunteering. It is an ideal opportunity to get freshers involved in these proj-ects as soon as they arrive on campus meaning that all parties will benefit.


O’Connor: VP Student Activities has much less of a focus on student media this year then as in previous years, with the core functions of VP Media and Communications being taken up by a trained professional. However much of my role over the past year has involved the promoting and coordinating of events by means of media so I realise the impact that it has on the student population at University of Glasgow. This position will see the uptake of the coordinating of all 4 student media groups.

Having communicated with people

involved in these projects I feel the problems encountered by them are ones which I have experienced before. Funding is always an important aspect and media groups cannot function if they do not have sufficient funds, therefore the search for advertisement and sponsorship is vital and I aim to aid them with this if elected. With my help and dedication I hope to see publica-tions being as successful as they have been previously and continually seeing a diverse group of contributors.

Guardian: Why have you picked this role?

O’Connor: I feel I have the most rel-evant experience and can make the biggest contribution to VP Activities. I understand the commitment needed for the role and have the required vir-tues of good people skills, enthusiasm and reliability.

Guardian: Why are you running for VP Activities?

Rae: For me, it’s all about the issues. It’s not about staying in a job for twelve months. It’s a new role so we need someone who understands the SRC, which I can bring to it having been in-volved in student media and with the unions for six years. Because I’ve been so involved with the uni since 2007, I have a real passion for it. I’ve had the time of my life here because I’ve got so involved with activities outside of my degree - it’s so much more than just a degree.

Guardian: What do you think of the new role?

Rae: There’s going to be some chal-

lenges. Student media was a major part of the previous role and it’s a shame the consultation that was had with student media wasn’t given more consider-ation. Student media needed more space but it’s good that there’s still someone here to support them, and I’ll fight to make sure they’re not sub-sumed in any way.

Guardian: What would you bring to the role over the other candidates?

Rae: It’s really difficult to write a manifesto for a new role, but I do have previous SRC experience, and now Freshers’ Week will be an important part. In my research, 40% of those who were surveyed didn’t think their pass was value for money, which is such a

shame because I really enjoyed Fresh-ers’ Week. We have different types of students attracted here so it’s impor-tant we make it accessible and fun for them all. Because I have SRC experi-ence, I understand the SRC but I also understand the perception of the SRC. A lot of people don’t realise what the SRC does for them, and I think it’s im-portant to promote them on campus.

Guardian: What do you think are your chances of winning?

Rae: I think that there is everything to play for. I think that I could have a good chance with a good campaign and making sure to be out on campus both Wednesday and Thursday. I hope to make the most out of the hustings

and show people that I am the most ex-perienced for the role.


Rae: I was Controller in 2010-11; Head of Programmes this year (2012-13). I have produced the coverage of the last three Freshers’ Weeks; helped to coordinate the National Student Televi-sion Awards in 2010 as well as helping to write constitution that formed the NaSTA exec. I have also near enough held a position continually in GUST since I joined the station.


Elder statesman of the SRC and ‘vegetar-ian’. Harrison has been on SRC council for approximately 26 years, but has no bias whatsoever towards it.

James Harrison

power and influence 6physical presence 3legacy and legend 3public image 2 election experience 8

Jess mcGrellis Gavin TullocH

razvan BalaBan craiG anGus Davey lockHarT

louise GraHam


President elect of SRC. Former head of GULGBTQ. Possessor of super positive vibes.

power and influence10(claimed) 4 (actual)

physical presence 8legacy and legend 3public image 2 election experience 6

Multi-billionaire and probably the most powerful person at the university. Ru-moured to speak 45 languages. Former TV star in Romania, consider him their an-swer to Matt Baker.

Friend of student media, GUU survivor, chief e-mail sender at SRC. Spends a lot of time making references that nobody gets.


Good things come in small packages. A tough wee critter. Less of a disgrace than previous GUU presidents and consid-erably better looking. Has managed to avoid dining exclusively on union lasagne and Tennents


Engine room of the GUU, and - just like Chris Sibbald - always unopposed on election day... suspicious of GUU’s presi-dent elect?


Official GUU superhero. Irish, interests include dressing up. Irish. Funny accent. Irish.

Breffni o’connor


GUU games convenor turned VP Student Support, taking the more humane ele-ments of Iron Stomach (solving campus hunger) to the SRC.


TOP TRUMPS 2013It is top trumps. We shouldn’t have to explain it, but for those of you who had troubled childhoods here we go. The cards are dealt among the players. There must be at least two players, and at least one card for each player. Selects a category from your first card and read out its value. Each other player then reads out the value of the same category from their first cards. The highest number wins. The person who wins takes all the other cards used in the round. Repeat until one player has all the cards or you find something better to do with your time.

CULTURE 12-16NEWS 2-7MARCH 5TH 2013 VIEWS 8-11 SPORT 9

colum fraser

cHarles ‘ck’ kenneDy

sTuarT law

cHris millar

mark eDGe

lucy JoHnsTone Dan Paris

BoBBy rae

oli coomBs

Good things come in small packages. A tough wee critter. Less of a disgrace than previous GUU presidents and consid-erably better looking. Has managed to avoid dining exclusively on union lasagne and Tennents



“Lads, I’ll have a Diet Coke, please”. An actual politician. Not around much. Least loathed Liberal Democrat in Britain.

Engine room of the GUU, and - just like Chris Sibbald - always unopposed on election day... suspicious of GUU’s presi-dent elect?


I was going to say something about Glasgow’s answer to Floyd Mayweather ‘boxing clever’ but then I realised I don’t know what that expression means. I looked up www.theinternet.com and found this: “Boxing clever means not only thinking outside the box, but re-defining the common thought process itself”. Oh, Chris is the GUSA President, king of sport. The king.



Young Stuart is the incoming emperor of all things Black and Gold. A charm-ing man, fond of a drink. Perhaps the embodiment of the timeless mantra: ‘my drinking club has a hockey problem’.


GUU games convenor turned VP Student Support, taking the more humane ele-ments of Iron Stomach (solving campus hunger) to the SRC.


SRC College Convenor of Social Scienc-es, which is the art of having a fine glass of chardonnay with some good friends whilst talking about beakers and osmosis and gravity. That sort of thing. Organis-ing it.



Current president of Swimming and Wa-terpolo at Glasgow, and candidate for VP Education. Will be hoping to bring that famous buoyancy to the John Mac. Great hair. I mean, really great.

Scottish Independence type but not, I re-peat, NOT a Nationalist. Big on the no-tion of education as a right. Named after Paris, the city on the banks of the Seine, in France. Paris does not commute from Paris.

Bobby! He’s been in GUST forever. We mean literally FOREVER. He’s done ev-erything there is to GUST, he bleeds GUST. Began student career late in the Thatcher era. Student-media aficionado and VP Activities candidate.

Wallflower. Infamously announced his candidacy for SRC election at the... ahem, QMU presidential hustings. Nice one. Cartwheeling enthusiast.




The smiley and non-cynical face of the QMU. Deprived of pocket money, and sent to his room with no supper.


EditorsDasha Miller & Oliver Milne

News & ViewsClaire Diamond, Louise Wilson, Han-nah McNeill, Samantha Wigglesworth, Rosannah Jones, Gareth Davis.

Election CoverageOliver Milne, Louise Wilson, Claire Diamond.

CultureRoss Hetherington, Beatrice Cook, Kate Hole.

Photography & IllustrationDasha Miller, Stuart Crawford, Pamela Graham (www.jamesvsburger.com), Sean Anderson, Flickr Creative Com-mons.

Proofing, Layout & Copyediting Dasha Miller, Oliver Milne, Louise Wilson.

Got thought?If you would like to provide anony-mous tipoffs or articles, please get in touch by way of note attached to brick

lobbed through our office window, just above and to the left of the Main Gate on University Avenue.

[email protected]@[email protected]@[email protected]

CONTRIBUTORS

Muscatelli on Western Infirmary site redevelopment

Louise Wilson

Guardian: What would you person-ally like to see done with the Western Infirmary site?

Muscatelli: I think it’s important that it’s not just the Western Infirmary site, and that’s why when we started the campus vision programme it was not simply about adding a few more build-ings to our existing estate. We really wanted to take it as an opportunity to consult fully with all students; staff; the West End community; the city council and all our stakeholders to say this is a fantastic opportunity for us to really look at the campus and reshape it, we really want to consult from the start.

The sort of themes that are very im-portant to me personally, but without prejudging the consultation in any way. I think it’s a fantastic opportunity for us to see what sort of spaces we need in terms of learning and teaching, for the future, and the spaces that we need for research.

One of the things that was coming through from the earlier consultations was open space - what the campus looks like. We’ve been very lucky here in getting a campus in Gilmorehill. We have the Gilbert Scott building, that’s been a very iconic building, and I think people will want to develop something which is still valued in 50, 100, 200 years time. So I think, it’s a simply fan-tastic opportunity to say: “what do we need as a community?”

Guardian: How much was the West-ern Infirmary site bought for?

Muscatelli: We’re not disclosing the fee or the purchase price just yet be-

cause we are still concluding 4 acres. One thing I can say, as you’re probably aware, is 10 acres already belonged to the university before they were ceded, and so that history clearly has been taken into account. It’s also important, partly because of the history, partly also because we have purchased the land really for educational, and not for com-mercial use. That’s clearly influenced the decision.

Guardian: What is the budget for the redevelopment of the site? And what is the timescale of the redevelopment?

Muscatelli: It highly depends on what the vision is. It’s going to be sub-stantial and it’s going to be over a long timescale of course, because if you think of Gilmorehill, this building was built in the period between 1870s - 1880s, but then we built the whole site up over 40 or 50 years. It probably won’t take us 40 or 50 years, but we’ve got to remember it’s about the whole campus, it’s not just about putting new buildings on there. We can’t set a timetable until we’ve finished the scoping out of the vi-sion, but it’s certainly going to be more than a decade.

Over the next 5 years we’re plan-ning on new building spending of over £55 million on refurbishments, so that gives you an idea of the scale, that’s £135 million over the next five years. And that’s before we get access to the site. I think what’s important about that is if you think of the university as spending about between £20-30 mil-lion a year anyway on new buildings and refurbishment, then you will soon see that with a new site you’re talk-ing about hundreds of million, which has a potentially remarkable impact. I

compared it to being on the scale of the Commonwealth Games for Glasgow. That is roughly of the order of £200 mil-lion, so really we’re talking about some-thing of that scale.

Guardian: Why is this such an im-portant investment for the University, particularly in the current economic climate?

Muscatelli: Physical infrastructure is important for what we do regardless of the economic climate. Those who came before us, generations before us, have left us this great legacy. We’re also very lucky because we have a city-based university with a campus, very few city-based universities like ours have a single campus, so we have an ideal opportunity to develop it, regardless of what times we’re in.

I think in times of the economic cli-mate, there is a win-win here, because the University of Glasgow counts for about 0.5% of Scotland’s GDP and about 3.6% of the west of Scotland’s GDP, roughly. In times like this, when the economy is still stagnating, I think the numbers point it out: it’s a real op-portunity for capital investment and re-ally help the local economy. From my point of view, it’s right for us, because it’s an opportunity of, not our lifetime, but many lifetimes, but it also happens to be at a time when it could be of great benefit, to the work, the jobs that will be created in infrastructure and ap-prentices.

I think this is why we’ve had some supportive comments. It’s great to see something like this, where everybody is aligned. The university community want to make best use of it, and want to see what the consultation brings.

Guardian: How much input have stu-dents had so far? How do you plan to engage with students in the future?

Muscatelli: The first consultation ex-ercise as you know on the 20th Febru-ary was held in the Welcome Point. I think that was important, getting input from the community, staff, students. Drop-in events are being managed by Estates & Buildings. I think going for-ward, we need everybody involved. We want to have continuous engagement, because this is really about big ideas and big themes. How open should the campus be? How should it relate to the surroundings? As we begin to develop and make these more concrete we’ll need to have continuous consultations. One of the things I would stress is that I think it’s really important that students

get involved at this stage, individually and collectively, from the associations, the student unions. They really have a chance to shape the future, and that re-ally doesn’t happen to that many gen-erations of students. The initial stage of consultation closes on 8th March, but the Gilmorehill campus vision bro-chures and display materials will still be available in the Welcome Point so there’ll still be a way to have your say. Then after that we’ll go away, take these ideas, and begin to formulate some op-tions.

Guardian: What kind of new facilities can we expect to see appear on campus with the additional space?

Muscatelli: It’s difficult to pre-empt it, it’s really over to what students and staff will want. Repeating what I’ve heard in feedback from individuals, I’m getting a feeling that people don’t only care about the building, but they really care about the overall look of the campus. We’re also looking for good, modern and forward-looking learning facilities, social learning spaces. I think the other thing that we’re getting back is that people also care not only about the direct benefits on the student com-munity, so things like cultural assets. I’ve mentioned the Gilbert Scott build-ing, we all know how much we value it. We must ask ourselves the question: how do we make use of the cultural as-sets in the new campus vision? I can’t really go into any more specifics be-cause it depends what comes out of the consultation.

Guardian: The Boyd Orr building in particular is seen as an eyesore. What can we expect to happen to the future of the Boyd Orr?

Muscatelli: What’s interesting to me is that some people say it’s an eyesore, others have actually said they liked it - so there’s a divided opinion even on that. One of the things that the Boyd Orr provides at the moment, which we’ll need to address, is that it’s a very efficient use of space, so I think we will need to listen to people in the consul-tation. Do they want to replace these high density buildings? Or do we want to do something as we did with library, which is regular refurbishments, recre-ate the right sort of spaces through the cladding that’s currently happening?

We value some of these existing as-sets. I think that will vary from build-ing to building; some will be ones we can make use of, because people find them useful and effective, and others

perhaps they’ll say well really we need to replace them. These are exactly the sorts of important issues.

Guardian: The GUU is obviously be-ing redeveloped, replacing the Exten-sion. However, the QMU is also is need of some attention. Will the redevelop-ment of the Western Infirmary site ad-dress the QMU?

Muscatelli: One of the things which is absolutely central to the plans is our students. I don’t think it would be ap-propriate to say this is where the Union should be on the future campus, be-cause again I think that’s all part of the consultation. And it’s partly about what other things would be around it, and so I would rather emphasise that when-ever we’ve tried to do things which involves proximity with the Unions. If you take the Stephenson extension as an example, it’s been in partnership, and that goes for both Unions. We’ll certainly factor in what the Unions will need, and also what the SRC will need in terms of going forward.

Guardian: The last major redevelop-ment of the University, in 1870, entirely relocated the campus. How large a sig-nificance will the extra 15 acres have on the campus as we know it today?

Muscatelli: I’ve always said it’s as sig-nificant as when the first college of the university was built, as you probably know when we were formed we didn’t have a college of our own, we met in the Cathedral. And then a college was built, and then we built Gilmorehill. So it’s one of those highly significant phases, I see it as something on that basis.

What the development of Gilmore-hill did was to guarantee future devel-opment by moving the campus from the centre of town. That’s what I see the Western Infirmary doing for us. I see us being able to fulfil not only the ambi-tions of Glasgow, but we need to try and look ahead at the next 2 or 3 strategic plans as far as we can, and say: “What is it that future generations of students of Glasgow will need?” It’s a fantastic opportunity, certainly on the scale of moving here. It’s hugely exciting times, being able to establish ourselves even more firmly as a campus university within the city. Guaranteeing that for many future generations is the biggest theme that we have. If we hadn’t had this opportunity, then as we expanded we would have had real constraints.

CULTURE 12-16NEWS 2-7MARCH 5TH 2013 VIEWS 8-11 SPORT 11CULTURE 12-21VIEWS 6-11

LETTERS

pharmacy

Auntie Jen

Hello my darlings. Spring is definitely in the air and the old scarf and wooly hat have been stuffed back into the bot-tom drawer. The lethargy of the winter months can be shaken off given the promise of blue skies and sunny days.

This year’s No Smoking Day cam-paign, Swap Fags for Swag, has been raising awareness of the risks - and costs - of smoking. Focus groups show that the cost of smoking is one of the main drivers for quitting but the health benefits of quitting can’t ignored. For example, within 24 hours of quitting, your lungs start to clear out the build up of tar and carbon monoxide is elimi-nated from the body. Within 48 hours, there is no nicotine left in the body; within 72 hours, breathing becomes easier, the bronchial tubes begin to re-lax and energy levels increase. You get the idea - and smokers who stop before the age of 35 have a life expectancy not significantly different from that of a non-smoker.

There are various ways to quit or reduce smoking and you can get help as part of the free NHS stop smoking pharmacy programme. Nicotine re-placement therapy can work for many people, through products such as sprays, gums and patches; there are also e-cigs, less harmful alternatives to cigarettes, as they don’t contain many of the toxins and can be nicotine free. If you’re trying to quit, the pharmacy team can help you along every step of the way; also, check out http://www.

wequit.co.uk/. Smoking can lead to cancer and the

pharmacy is working with Macmil-lan Cancer Scotland on the launch of its new drop-in service at Hillhead Li-brary, which offers tea, coffee and bis-cuits and a chance to chat with others. The campus pharmacy is serving as a hub for student volunteers involved in the new service and for raising aware-ness through information, aimed as much at family members and friends of anyone affected by cancer.

On a lighter note, did you know that the tweeps at the campus pharmacy are up for four national awards? They picked up a couple of awards last year too and it’s grand to know there’s an award-winning service on campus and good to use for all your health and well-being needs. It doesn’t even mat-ter where your GP surgery is, the phar-macy can help you (staff, student, not sure) even if your GP is in Timbuktu!

Talking of which, if you’re off some-where exotic this summer, remember there’s also a subsidised travel clinic, which will keep you right when it comes to mosquitoes and other creepy crawlies as well as associated health risks; it’s also a registered Yellow Fever centre - www.hillheadpharmacy.com/travel-clinic.

Right, I’m off for a frothy wee latte in the lovely Food Court, then it’s time to shake some booty - and lethargy - as there is blue skies and sunshine today. Go well my lovelies.

facebook.com/hillheadpharmacytwitter.com/hillheadpharmac

EDITORIAL

Sam Wigglesworth

It’s that age old problem, you can’t get a job without experience, but nobody is willing to hire you so you can’t get it. Internships, it has been proposed are a solution to this catch-22 problem. However, they’re not accessible to ev-eryone, for two key reasons.

Firstly, given that many internships require students or graduates work-ing for long periods of time, usually for free, it’s not an opportunity that many can afford. However, recent debate and campaigns that have been ignited by the National Union of Students and Labour’s Hazel Blears which have been attempting to deal with this issue, by dealing with the grey areas in the law that allow for the promotion of the advertising of unpaid internships, and highlighting what your rights actually are with regards to any internship that you may undertake.

Secondly, internships or placements are still an elite sector, proven most notably by the Conservatives ‘auction’ of internships in 2011 which has now

lead to the perceived legitimacy of the practice, with fundraising events hold-ing hundreds of internship auctions. And it’s not just in the United Kingdom; the US website CharityBuzz sold one internship at Vogue for $42 500 in 2010. Meanwhile, there’s the accusation that the selection for an internship is elite in itself; top banks and businesses looking for an Oxbridge watermark before let-ting anyone through to the next stage. Meanwhile, despite Clegg’s attempt in 2011 to end the practice of informal internships at Whitehall in an attempt to improve social mobility seems to have bore little fruit, as a quick Google search turned up nothing (and it’s rare that Google ever fails anyone) And you can call me cynical, but I find it hard to believe people will stop calling in fa-vours for loved ones to get that ever so elusive experience.

However, in defence of the intern-ship, there are three reasons why it is worth all the fuss, and this is coming from a student who has been rejected from at least one dream internship.

One. It is a fantastic way to gain con-tacts in the industry, company, occu-

Whilst I feel hugely privileged to be part of the up-coming Referendum, I am also rather concerned about key organ-isational shortfalls within its organisa-tion, and my views are shared by many people around campus.

I must thank all the parties involved for their involvement and organisation of the Referendum as overall, they are doing a fantastic job. They have pre-sented Glasgow University students with an opportunity not only to discuss serious questions surrounding the Ref-erendum, but also to provide Scotland with its first real indication of voting patterns prior to 2014. However, there are serious shortfalls and problems sur-rounding the event that have not been addressed. The fundamental problem I have is with regard to polling stations. We are a huge University, encompass-ing thousands of students over a large geographical area, not only around the City of Glasgow, but also around Scot-land. I ask you, where is their right to vote? Students in the Vet, Medical and Dental Schools, on Placement, or those who cannot access the main campus on a regular basis - how are their voices going to be represented?

With the high levels of media cov-erage, Scotland will be watching. We cannot simply allow a huge proportion of our students to go ignored, as it will never be a truly representative result. I would like to challenge the organisers of the event to carefully consider these issues. This is the first major test of the Referendum, as well as the Better To-gether and Yes Scotland campaigns. We do not want to look back at this im-portant moment within our University careers and see it invalidated by not being truly representative.

Carys HughesSecretary of the Glasgow University Conservative and Unionist Association

The internship paradox

pation you desire to be in. Especially if you don’t know anybody in that field. Sure, it’s hard to get one, but once you do and providing you make a good im-pression, it can only be good for you.

Two. It is something that increases your chances of getting hired once Uni-versity is complete and you enter the real world and accept adult life (some-what begrudgingly no doubt)

Three. It’s a great way to figure out if the job you’ve dreamt of doing is really worth all of the fuss.

So should people just throw in the towel if they possess neither parent in their field of choice and only a lowly Russell Group University stamp? I could be idealistic here, but I still be-lieve that an internship is better than none. In addition to this, even though the odds may be against you with re-gards to getting one, they’re almost cer-tainly stacked higher if you don’t even apply.

This year’s SRC election sees 72% of positions either unfilled or with candi-dates going unopposed and essentially unscrutinized. When many people heard this they were shocked. We were not.

The SRC is suffering from an crisis in engagement and democracy and the worst part is that it has been happening for so long that nobody even notices. It is easy to shrug off the low levels of interest in standing for this election as something which occasionally occurs. Indeed this election is not the worst in SRC history. That dubious accolade goes to the election held in 2009,which failed at - at its first attempt - to fill the four of the sabbatical positions on offer at the SRC.

However, low interests in elections are not the problem. They are the symp-tom of the a far more dangerous condi-tion which renders the representative functions of our SRC unfit for purpose. To be very clear, the problems are not with the entirety of the SRC. The Advice Centre, photocopying, volunteering opportunities and - of course - student media are services which are well at-tended, well run and are amongst some of the best of their kind in the country. The problem lies with the SRC’s core and most important function: it’s abil-ity to engage and as a result represent the interests of student’s at of the Uni-versity of Glasgow.

The problems are manifold. When did the SRC last run a campaign fo-cussed on student welfare which ex-tended beyond posters, a few emails and a poorly intended event or two? Where was the public campaign which names and shames some of Glasgow’s worst landlords? Again this isn’t to say nothing of value has been done. The in-troduction of a Carer’s policy, changes to accessibility and hard fought chang-es to the University’s Debt Policy are all achievements of which SRC sabbatical officers can be rightly proud.

But it isn’t enough to simply change University policy. Changes like these are most meaningful not when they happen because of the interest of a par-ticular sabbatical officer but when they come directly from the concerns of the student body. To achieve this the SRC must seek to engage students more di-rectly. This cannot be done from an office in John Mac but by open and

public consultation. We need to see Sabbs in Libraries and visiting Halls. The current system, with its presump-tion that people will come to you when a problem exists, isn’t fit for purpose in a world where students face increasing demands their time.

The democratic structures of the SRC need updating, particularly with regards to the roles of its Welfare of-ficers. It is not enough to simply elect an officer once a year and hope that this transforms the experience of those groups at our University. Campaigns built by those who identify into these welfare groupings, meeting in open and accessible caucuses, are the only way which those who find themselves disadvantaged in an unjust society can liberate themselves in a manner of their choosing. To this end much can be learned by the best practice found in the NUS.

Recent changes to the composition of the SRC’s sabbatical team are largely superficial but highlight a willingness to change. It is however regrettable that a consultation on how they should change took place largely behind closed doors and without direct imput from the student body.

Which brings us to this election. Read the interviews contained in

this election special and remember to vote. The candidates are - in the most part - passionate and conscientious individuals. If you don’t agree with this sentiment then make use of the recent-ly introduced mechanism to Re-open Nominations.

But voting isn’t enough. An open, engaged and accountable SRC isn’t created by any single President but by students demanding more from their elected representatives.

We would also like to make one humble suggestion. We’d like you to vote for Bobby Rae for Vice President Student Activities. Rarely has this paper endorsed candidates in its past, the last time was in 2005, but we have felt that this endorsement is the natural out-come of his work. A committed volun-teer and Head Of Factual Programming at Glasgow University Student Televi-sion, it is the view of the Editors that he the most qualified candidate to take on this challenging role which has at its core Glasgow’s student media.

Happy voting.


Studying at Edinburgh Napier University will help you do just that, with our state-of-the-art facilities and industry accredited courses we have a lot to offer you.

Our courses are developed in consultation with employers to further enhance their relevance.

Your postgraduate degree will be contemporary, relevant and grounded in first-hand, industry experience.

To put it simply, at Edinburgh Napier, we’ll help you become Futureproof. We’ll guide your first steps on the path leading to a brighter future and show you how to ensure

you remain competitive and successful throughout your career.

Visit www.napier.ac.uk/postgraduate for more information.

Futureproof your career.

CULTURE 12-16NEWS 2-7MARCH 5TH 2013 VIEWS 6-11 SPORT 13CULTURE 14-21

Ross Hetherington

“Ghosts of Mars! – Holy Fuck!"“Did I hear right?”“Yes, you did.” “Ghosts of Mars! – Holy Fuck!”

I do not know if it is possible to do a double take within one’s internal monologue. But if it is...

I am seated here in the GFT. First Minister Alex Salmond is the guest of Kapow! – the Glasgow Film Festival’s comics, sci-fi and fantasy division – their GEEK Night Special. He has just announced that the film he has chosen us geeks to watch is: John Carpenter’s Ghosts of Mars. Indeed, he has had to cut short a meeting with the Swedish Ambassador to get here, the traffic was bad.

Opposite sits his interviewer – Mark Millar, Glasgow’s comics supremo and Kapow! co-curator: “So, why this film, Alex?” For those of us who have seen the film, the question might as well be followed by a crescendo of backwards strings. My God, are the rumours true? Is this man out to ruin Scotland? Is he even a man at all, or some batrachian mer-brute, sprung from Lovecraftian, Linlithgonian nightmare? What else could explain such a vile filmic selec-tion?

“Well, the first thing to say is that it is an incredibly bad film.” Ecce Homo – my faith in Independence is restored.

In fact, as Alex and Mark’s introduc-tory chat and audience questions con-tinues, Millar’s description of Salmond as “First Minister of Fandom” seems more and more apposite. He knows that Carpenter co-wrote Dark Star with Dan O’Bannon, and that he turned down the opportunity to direct Top Gun. I don’t know these things off the top of my head,

and I certainly don’t have a small

model of 7/9 from Star Trek: Voyager on my Christmas tree. He did get the name of Natasha Henstridge’s char-acter in Species wrong, but I’ve had to look this up myself – I guess he really is human after all.

I suspect that if Salmond was pros-ecuting a Yes-vote on all nerds joining him to set up a new country on Arran, he would probably have it in the bag by now. He chats about seeing both broad-casts of the first ever episode of Dr Who, and reading Justice League of America when he was wee. His original choice for a film to show us tonight was Qua-termass and the Pit. Originally a classic BBC serial, it was remade later by Ham-mer. I’ve never seen it. It is reputedly top-notch. But Salmond thought we would have more fun watching Ghosts of Mars, which he, interestingly, sees as Carpenter’s homage to Quatermass. Ghosts of Mars, however, is no classic.

I’ve now seen Ghosts of Mars four times: twice pretty much against my will. Carpenter has a special place in many people’s hearts for such classics as The Thing and Big Trouble in Little China. And for many people, John Car-penter’s Ghosts of Mars also has a spe-cial place – as the large spud of globular cholesterol that once almost caused them to have a cinematic coronary.

The film is truly dire. It is the only film I know to contain a flashback with-in a flashback within a flashback, and it brings new meaning to the phrase “Ice Cube in Red Desert Combats”. Mars is in the process of being terraformed, when contact mysteriously begins to be lost with outlying settlements. Miners have opened a Pandora’s Box, and are now facing consequences they never could have expected (“It’s like Britain under Thatcher” Millar quips). Ghosts of the ancient Martians have been realised, possessing many of the colonists, and slowly turning them into extras from 90s Aussie kids serial The Tribe. They

are lead by their corpse-painted leader: imagine that Eric Draven and Top Dol-lar from The Crow took a break from beating the living Goth out of each other and instead had a giant lanky baby. In Ghosts of Mars, such a being now stalks the planet, with his blood curdling, Fozzy Bear inspired battle cry “WAKA WAKA WAKAAAARRRRR!!”

Unwittingly, in step Natasha Hen-stridge and a pre-beetle brow Jason Statham – Mars cops: armed and ready to deliver wooden dialogue – on a mis-sion to transport criminal James “Des-olation” Williams – played, with some

of the best pet lip-based acting I’ve ever seen, by Ice Cube. Soon, the bad act-ing is everywhere, and it’s time escape (from Mars) or die (like Carpenter’s career did for nine years after this film was made).

As an ill-judged late night shite-fest, Ghosts of Mars is an unremitting slog for even the most dedicated connois-seur of Bad Film. As a cinema experi-ence, with a rotund and charismatic nationalist trekkie at the helm, it’s a surprising hoot. I had a great time, as did the audience, to my reckoning. If Nicola Sturgeon approaches Mark Mil-

lar, suggesting a special screening of Battlefield Earth, what could my an-swer otherwise be, but: Yasssssssssss!

NB: The pro-independence sentiments expressed in this piece are the authors own, and should not be taken as repre-sentative of the attitudes of the Guard-ian staff. At any rate, it’s only a bit of salt to bring out the flavour: if you want to go to a Pink Floyd gig hosted by Alistair Darling then write about it, I’ll be grab-bing the copy with gusto.

First Minister of Mars

Review: Cocktail & Burger

Kate Hole

Cocktail & Burger is a name that either entices or repulses you, connoting a classic student-hungry establishment providing two of our most obvious favourite things. However, this new burger joint hidden away in a Sauchie-hall Street basement has more to offer than would first appear. It’s a place that seems to actually value and respect its customers, and not just in a ‘so you come back and we can make more money’ way.

As one might assume, the menu is predominantly burgers but, as with any good restaurant, the offerings are all about quality, not quantity. These people are taking their time, perfecting their food, and keeping their ingredi-ents fresh by keeping their menu clev-erly concise. By focusing on and per-fecting what goes on each plate, they’ve created a handful of simple delicacies rather than a mountain of hit-and-miss concoctions.

The menu also prides itself in ac-knowledging the exact farm from

which its Aberdeen Angus meat comes from, further indicating we have some real food respect going on here. I’m sure many more restaurants will be hoping to do the same sort of thing fol-lowing on from the recent horsemeat revelations, but dubious how many will actually be able to.

After I finished drawing profound respect for the menu, I went for the simple ‘C&B’ - a trusty cheese and ba-con beef burger. Never did I expect to get so excited about something so safe: the meat was succulent, the top-pings perfectly proportioned and the mature cheese plentiful. Furthermore, the rich and buttery toasted brioche bun that encases all this excitement, al-though not particularly pleasing to the eye, is super delicious and really sets these burgers aside from many other. Somehow, this choice of flavour over aesthetics makes me respect these guys even more. Other offerings include juicy slow-cooked pulled pork belly with Kopparberg cider onions, lamb with mint and tzatziki, roast Portobello mushrooms with blue cheese and beef or pork hot dogs that boast real and

flavoursome meat rather than reconsti-tuted madness – hallelujah. Add some tasty professional cocktails into the mix (with old favourites White Russian, French Martini and Cosmopolitan on promo) and you’ll spend your entire meal working out when you can come back to try everything else.

Ultimately, there is some real food love going on in Cocktail & Burger. Nothing is left uncared for; even a side of bread and butter comes with ‘homemade brandy infused balsamic butter’ for goodness sake. And the best bit? Two for one burgers and hot dogs all day, every day. Priced around £7/8 each, we’re talking £4 for some really good food. I only hope enough people clock what a gem we’ve been given amongst the fast food hysteria of Sauchiehall Street and give the place the custom it deserves in order to keep busy, and prove quality can be student-friendly and affordable.

Cocktail and Burger is located at 323 Sauchiehall Street (but blink and you’ll miss it).

Photo: www.jamesvsburger.com


Opportunity. It’s staring you in the face.

© February 2013 PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP. All rights reserved. *Texts charged at your standard network rate.

Undergraduate and Graduate OpportunitiesIt’s February already, so there’s no time to lose. Apply now to make the most of your opportunities with PwC in 2013. Text ‘PwC Glasgow’ to 60300* for a chance to win an iPad mini and get details of the events we’ll be attending at Glasgow this month.

Take the opportunity of a lifetime

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037848-355x266-Glasgow.indd 1 28/01/2013 09:17

CULTURE 12-16NEWS 2-7MARCH 5TH 2013 VIEWS 6-11 SPORT 15CULTURE 14-21

Beatrice Cook

Things are set to blow up this year for Mancunian four-piece The 1975; with recent backing from Radio 1 DJ Zane Lowe, and garnering glowing reviews for their alternative and eclectic sound, it is without a doubt the band’s time to step up to the spotlight. The 1975 can-not really be put into the proverbial box when it comes to defining their genre of music; however there is a distinct shift towards the indie-rock end of the spectrum, with a subtle note of melan-cholic nostalgia and a general feel good vibe to their latest EP, Music For Cars. Between releasing three EPs, a debut album, two tours within the space of less than six months, with a third one to follow shortly, it’s been without a doubt a hectic past year for the band; I managed to catch up with lead singer Matt Healey before the band’s gig at the legendary venue King Tut’s on the 27th January:

Guardian: After numerous name changes (The Slowdown, The Big Sleep, Drive Like I Do), what was the decision

behind settling on The 1975?Matt Healey: I went to Majorca when

I was nineteen, and I befriended this artist who lived out there. He gave me loads of beat poetry, Kerouac literature and I found a suicide page in one of the books. It was dated the 1st of June The 1975. And that really stuck with me, the use of the word ‘the’ preceding a date and I never really thought about it until we came to naming the band and I was thinking of things I liked the sound of and that was it.

We didn’t like the name The Slow-down, nearly got sued when we were called The Big Sleep. When it came to changing the name, everyone acted like it was a bit of a big deal. But it wasn’t really a big deal because no one really knew who we were, and we just wanted to have a fresh start. It was January 2012 when we were in the studio as The 1975 for the first time.

G: Your new EP Music for Cars is set to be released on March 4th; how does this coincide with the release of your debut album?

MH: You’ve got to release a certain amount of material before you put an

album out, that’s just the way it goes. We wanted to create a really solid foun-dation for people to understand what we were doing; I think people make the common misconception that our ma-terial is worked kind of chronologically, whereas in reality the majority of the stuff on the EPs has been written after the album. The album was pretty much there at the beginning of last year, so we took singles off it; ‘The City’, ‘Sex’ and ‘Chocolate’, and then wrote EPs around them to kind of take a part of the story and embellish it even further. We didn’t want to be one of those bands that put out an EP that has a single on it, a re-mix, and acoustic or a live version on it. We are very proud of our EPs; we see our EPs as our first album really, and our debut album is a follow up to that.

G: How is the album coming along? How would you describe its sound and what it means for the band?

MH: I wouldn’t know where to start. I’d like to say if you listened to the EPs you’d probably have a good idea, but you wouldn’t. It’s kind of based on 80’s movie soundtrack. My main in-spiration as a songwriter is probably

[…the work of] John Hughes, movies like Pretty In Pink, The Breakfast Club, Weird Science, movies that I grew up with. And that’s where I first fell in love with music; music through film. It’s our soundtrack to our movie. Everybody has an idealistic vision of their past, and I think you tend to see your memo-ries in this hazy, cinematic way, and I think that’s the way we tried to write our songs. We don’t take ourselves very seriously as people, but as a project some of our music can be quite seri-ous, and I think there are serious ele-ments to this record. It’s a very person-ally geared album. There’s a song called ‘Girls’ on the record which is very fun, it’s a good time album.

G: You mentioned in an interview with When The Gramophone Rings that the album is a ‘soundtrack to our formative years’- what were your influ-ences and what was the kind of music that you grew up listening to?

MH: Music has been the only expres-sion I’ve ever had as a person, I don’t really orientate in any other way; every-thing’s really musically-minded for me, and I suppose I’m very lucky that this has started happening because I don’t have anything else that I’m good at. The first music I fell in love with was soul music, black American music, that’s where a lot of our sound comes from, artists like Otis Redding, Wilson Pick-ett, Donnie Hathaway. George (Daniel, drummer) is a big fan of hip hop which is where a lot of the drums come from. Bands that were peaking in the eight-ies were a big inspiration for us; Mi-chael Jackson in ‘Bad Era’, Peter Gabriel in ‘So’, Paul Simon on ‘Graceland’, its where all of these major albums came into their own. We wanted to make a re-ally ambitious album, that kind of took into account everything we’d been in-spired by.

G: You have been championed re-cently by Radio 1 DJ’s Zane Lowe and Huw Stephens- how is the band feeling about its rapidly growing popularity?

MH: We’ve been doing this for 10 years, and we’ve got so used to doing it for ourselves, that the expectation of validation from a mainstream radio outlet like that wasn’t really a real-ity for us. We never really assumed it would happen. I think the one thing it has done is [that it has] catalysed the progression in the knowledge of our-

selves as people, we’ve come to terms with who we are and what we’re do-ing and what our purpose is as band. I don’t think that would’ve happened without direct responses from people who were in to the music. It’s a very exciting time, it’s just hard for us be-cause, on the one hand, we’re so used to being a tiny band, and on the other hand, so conditioned not to get excited about prospects in the music industry because it’s a form of naivety. We’re just very privileged and very humbled to be here now.

G: How do you feel social media such as Facebook and Instagram influences the broadcasting of your music and identity to a prospective audience?

MH: George does all the Instagram. I think it was how were defined initially, because we took a very minimalist ap-proach to social networking; we just put a couple of songs out on YouTube. We live in a world where, especially in the music industry, accessibility is par-amount, and that’s what people care about. We wanted to reverse that and be a bit refreshing. We do have a Twitter and we do have a Facebook, but there’s not a lot of personal affinity with that. It’s very much the voice of the band as a band. We don’t tweet about ourselves as individuals because I don’t think our personalities as individuals are rel-evant to what we’re doing musically.

G: How was it playing Radio 1’s Fu-ture Festival with up and coming acts such as A$AP Rocky and Mallory Knox?

MH: I was so excited to meet him (A$AP). I actually got to meet him in my hotel two days later and we had a little chat and hung out for a bit which was amazing. It was an honour and a privilege, such a clichéd thing to say, but people don’t really know how much shit we’ve been through, and how much we’ve been through as a band. To have people that you’ve lis-tened to and respected for years vali-dating your presence by putting you as one of the bands at that festival, it was amazing. It was only a couple of weeks ago, and we’re already a bigger band because of it.

"Music For Cars" EP Available March 4th. UK Tour begins May 4th, tickets on sale now. (Glasgow date: 27th May, Oran Mor)

10 minutes with: The 1975

Radio Spotlight: ExcursionsKate Hole

Excursions is a fortnightly detour from your regular audio patterns into ‘the deepest depths of hip-hop, funk, house, bass, and general late-nite sleaze’. Their Monday night mixes of hot tracks and classic funk vinyl will leave you want-ing them to whisk you away for the whole week. Here are the guys’ favou-rite records to get you started.

Charizma & Peanut Butter Wolf – Devo-tionThis duos collaborating career was cut short when boy wonder MC Charizma was murdered at the age of 20. Re-corded in the early 90s, label troubles meant this record didn’t see the light

of day until 2003 when Peanut Butter Wolf founded Stones Throw and stuck it on wax.

93 til Infinity - Souls of MischiefThis is my personal favourite hip hop tune of all time. I remember hearing it on this MTV show when I was about 12 years old, long before I started getting into hip-hop. I had no idea what it was, but it blew my mind. Took a couple of years before I realised I could just Google the lyrics to find out.

King Tee – The CoolestThis record is 1987 West Coast rap in its prime; five golden minutes of King Tee telling us just how god damned cool he is. Word on the grapevine is that Big-gie’s Ready to Die is in fact a homage to

Tee’s deep voice and flow.

Hanna - I NeededI Needed is a tune off Hanna (aka War-ren Harris)'s 2004 album Exquisite Style. It didn't really take off at the time, but then it surfaced in Floating Points' Resident Advisor podcast last year and got some of the recognition it deserved. It's just perfect, soulful, melodic house music.

Schatrax – Aliena’s JourneyWe thanked our lucky stars when Fear of Flying delved into the Schatrax vaults last year and re-released this beautifully haunting techno classic. Wowee.

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Glasgow Guardian Issue 5 Election Special