Ben Margolis and Aasta Dahal have been elected to the positions of Undergraduate and Postgraduate SU Presidents respectively.

The position of Undergraduate SU President was particularly hotly contested, with five candidates vying for the position, and voting reaching the fourth round before Margolis’ ultimate victory could be determined. A total of 4,247 votes were cast in this election.

Ben Margolis had led throughout each round of voting, and, following the elimination of other candidates, won his position in the fourth round run-off on a total of 1,629 votes. He outstripped his nearest competitor, Henry Wright, by just 76 votes, with Wright winning a total of 1,553.

Matt Alderton, whose campaign had been hit with allegations of having used a homophobic slur within his college’s Facebook group while he was JCR Vice-President, was eliminated in the third round while Mimi Nandhla, who has previously told Varsity that she “decided to run for a bet”, was eliminated in the second. Both Rusty Smith and Re-Open Nominations (RON) were eliminated in the first round, receiving 112 and 274 first-preference votes respectively.

This was the first set of elections following the recent merger of CUSU and the GU into the new Cambridge Students’ Union (SU) following a referendum last November. This new SU will be jointly headed by Margolis and Dahal, representing undergraduate and postgraduate students respectively.

In contrast to the hotly contested election of Undergraduate President, Aastha Dahal comfortably won the position of Postgraduate President, winning 1,395 votes of a total of 2,744. The other candidate, Luisa Deragon, received just 708 votes, while Re-Open Nominations (RON) received 641.

This year’s SU elections saw a 20.88% turnout, with a total of 5,138 students casting their ballots. Although this represents the highest number of votes ever cast in a Cambridge Student Union election, due to year-on-year increases in student numbers this figure represents a proportional decrease on last year’s CUSU election turnout of 22.2%.

A total of 9.32% of postgraduate students voted in the election, representing an increase on previous years when turnout had never gone above 7%.

The minimal increase in total voter numbers, coupled with the fact that this constitutes a proportional decrease in overall turnout, will likely come as a disappointment to many of this year’s Presidential candidates, with several – including Henry Wright and Matt Alderton, who placed second and third respectively in the Undergraduate Presidential election – having specifically highlighted an increase in Student Union engagement as a central focus of their campaigns.

Having won the election, Margolis is set to begin implementing his manifesto which divides his commitments into three parts. First he proposes to make Cambridge education work for everyone by reducing student workload. His most eye-catching policy proposal is a week 5 reading week as well as ensuring that there are no contact hours on Wednesday afternoon.

The second aspect of his manifesto points to issues of representation. He hopes to bridge the divide between undergraduates and postgraduates by agreeing standardised roles for JCRs and MCRs, continuing the project that led to the creation of CSU. In terms of improving access Margolis intends to limit rent increases to inflation level yearly for new tenants and to standardise bursary funding across the colleges.

Finally he wants to turn the university into “a positive social force for everyone” by lobbying the university on divestment, scrutinising the implementation of Prevent and working with the Living Wage Campaign to ensure all workers have a Real Living Wage. These issues were frequently brought up by other candidates running for sabbatical roles and reflects the widespread discontent in the student body about how the University is run.

This year’s campaigning period has been particularly fraught, with Matt Alderton having previously accused the Students’ Union and the student press of launching a “a smear campaign” against him, after it was reported he had used a homophobic slur on his college’s JCR Facebook page.

This year also saw the use of innovative campaigning techniques in an attempt to increase voter turnout, including Henry Wright’s ‘swipe Wright’ Facebook campaign and Matt Alderton’s success in getting Cindies to use a personalised stamp supporting his campaign as students entered the club.

Margolis and Dahal will work alongside Chloe Newbold, Kerensa Gaunt, Esme Cavendish, Siyang Wei, Alice Gilderdale and Howard Chae in next year’s Student Union Sabbatical Team, set to take up their positions in July.