Graduate Union (GU) presidential candidate Joe Cotton has complained to the junior proctor after the CUSU/GU Elections Committee (EC) rejected an appeal against his disqualification from the election.

Sofia Ropek Hewson, from Pembroke, was declared the provisional winner on Monday after Cotton’s votes were discounted.

Cotton told Varsity he would be contacting the Junior Proctor, who will issue a judgement on EC’s decision, saying: “I remain hopeful for a fair and proportionate resolution that will build confidence in the democratic legitimacy of the Graduate Union”.

EC has no obligations under CUSU’s standing orders to carry out the recommendations of the junior proctor, currently Dr Gemma Burgess. However, EC confirmed to Varsity that “in our interpretation, the decision of the Junior Proctor is binding”.

The disqualification was the final twist in what was a fraught election for the role. Turnout in the vote for the GU – Cambridge’s separate student union for graduate, mature and fourth-year undergraduate students – was 1,148, a significant rise on the year before. The run-up to the vote was marked by a series of rule breaches, with Cotton, from Wolfson, and third-placed candidate Mrittunjoy Guha Majumdar, from Christ’s, both receiving warnings from EC.

Last year’s EC complied with a recommendation by the former junior proctor after Daisy Eyre, who went on to win election as CUSU president, complained after being issued with a twelve-hour campaign ban.

Cotton, who had won the most first-preference votes according to the nullified results, received a full disqualification after it was found he violated electoral rules for improper use of a tablet computer as a “mobile polling station”.

He was judged to have infringed upon the rule that “no candidate...may approach within three metres of the polling station except when they themselves are voting”, apparently by carrying around an iPad and encouraging people to cast their votes using it.

According to a statement from the EC, “insufficient steps were taken by Joe to provide space to those casting ballots on the iPad he had provided.”

Cotton raised an appeal against the EC ruling, saying it is “profoundly undemocratic to overturn the sovereign decision of the electorate on the basis of an inconsequential technicality.”

Dismissing his initial appeal on Friday, the EC said Cotton: “failed to address the key principle underlying the EC decision, that voters must feel free to cast their ballots free from influence.”

“[Cotton] could have had the rules on iPads clearly explained to him by emailing the EC, and in our opinion the rule is not phrased in such a way that a reasonable person would assume that it did not apply to iPads, and as such a candidate wishing to use them should have consulted the EC,” they added.

The EC said that, in their judgement, Cotton’s violation of the rules was severe, but did not invalidate the overall vote.

“Disqualification, therefore, appears to be the most satisfactory sanction both when it comes to reflecting the severity and importance of the rule breached and to ensure that no candidate who breached the rules severely is able to take part in the election,” they said.

The CUSU/GU Elections Committee did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Cotton’s decision to escalate his complaint.

Cotton said he hoped a changed outcome would underline “the necessity of greater engagement with [the GU’s] membership, so that the representation the GU provides is a true reflection of the needs and interests of the graduate community.”

Responding to EC’s ruling on Monday, Ropek Hewson said: “disqualification is the only sanction available to the Elections Committee that doesn’t also punish fairly run campaigns – the other possibility being voiding the election. We can’t possibly know for sure how many votes the candidate obtained in contravention of the election rules, thus disqualification seems just.”

“I very much appreciate the support of everyone who voted for me, and, if the CUSU/GU Elections Committee decision is upheld, look forward to my role as Graduate Union President, and to continuing working with the graduate community,” she said.

• Update 20th March 2018: This article was updated after the CUSU/GU elections committee responded to a comment request, confirming that they will consider the junior proctor’s ruling to be binding. It also corrected the stated duration of Daisy Eyre’s campaign ban last year: it was initially set at 12 hours, not nine.