Below are manifestos for the three contested positions. All other positions have been filled unopposed.

Don Carson — Sports Officer

I am the present Sports Officer, an executive member of the Wellington Committee on Vietnam, chairman of the Student Anti-Imperialist Front, and a student representative on the Joint Committee Council.

My reason for first standing for Sports Officer was to provide student voters with the opportunity to elect a politically unified executive. Previous execs, hamstrung by conservative elements had become isolated from student opinion, such as in the case of PBEC. I took my election as a mandate to further the actions of groups who oppose such things as the Vietnam war and South African sporting contacts. This was not to mean that my intention was to ignore the sports aspect of my portfolio, I believe that I have fulfilled my obligations in this regard as Sports Officer and on Sports Committee. Non students are paying more in sports clubs, there is now a pool table in the former Hart room. I would continue such a sports policy.

Most students do not vote; I do not represent them or their interests. Such students are representative of an ignorance and selfishness that imagines that their total apathy has no connection with the plight of their fellow man suffering under colonialism and imperialism throughout the world. To them especially, such concepts are mere word playing.

Should I be re-elected I will regard it as a mandate from concerned students to strive for increased social change both within the university and in its external relations.

In the university the main problem is assessment. In-term assessment, regarded as the panacea for all ills has become the all year round rack. No progress can be made until all assessment techniques employed are scrapped. Students are in a powerless position, incapable of controlling the university in which their destinies and those of society are decided. The university car park in Waiteata Road is an example of almost feudal privilege enjoyed by the administration who never use their parks.

In external relations developments must be carefully fostered. Rama's tenant's furniture in the Union was symbolic of a new student era of forming working relationships with radical groups and organisations beyond the university.

Russell Johnson — Sports Officer

Many students are no doubt wondering why I am running for both Man Vice President and Sport's Officer. It is not because my political ambitions have gone to my head. I am concerned to see a situation develop that has resulted in an almost non-election this year. In my memory, since I first enrolled at this university in 1967, this is the first time that a majority of posts on the executive have been filled unopposed in a student election. This has not come about as a result of student apathy or through satisfaction with the status quo on campus. I believe that it is because many potential candidates are simply too scared to run. They do not want to be involved in the factional abuse that is dealt to anyone who dares stand up against the current student leaders on this campus, as the Young Socialists have done.

I am running for more than one position on the executive because I want to see at least something in the lines of an election.

The current student executive and the editors of Salient bear a large part of the responsibility for the development of this stifling atmosphere where there is no room for the existence of dissenting views. And Don Carson, who I understand is running for sports officer for the third time, as a member of the current executive shares in the responsibility for the creation of the witch hunt atmosphere at Victoria.

I claim no sports administrative experience. Nor do I intend to outbid Don in the provision of billiards room, etc. However, I do have confidence in my ability to learn the job and pledge to represent student sporting interests to the best of my ability. And in my role on the student executive, if elected, I pledge to campaign for support for the points in the Young Socialist election manifesto, and to fight for a situation where there is room for all points of view to be freely expressed without any big sticks being held over the dissenters' heads.

Ken Howell — Man Vice-President

I see the role of Man Vice President not as a specialist position such as publications, but as a position to 1) Lighten the workload of the President and 2) To put a special emphasis on issues or activities that need attention.

While I fully support the SRC as the best way to set policy for the Students' Association I see several factors which stop it from being more efficient. The lack of interest of students in the democratic running of the Students' Association (like these elections) is comparable to the lack of interest students have in controlling their own courses. I support groups that have recently sprung up like the English students asking for more student control, and see the questions of internal assessment, student representation, what is an education, and student control as the most relevant issues to students. This notwithstanding, I see the relevance of furthering Students' Association support for organisations and individuals that are working for change in the wider society.

Communication between the Executive and other students and between students themselves is a continuing problem. I support other ways of communicating than SRC, ways where students can discuss ideas and their points of view. For instance, the introduction of groups for first year students to get to know one another and discuss ideas as at Canterbury University I see as a priority.

My previous experience in Students' Association affairs is as follows: 1972/73 President of SCM; 1973 Member of Union Management Committee and Catering Subcommittee; International Affairs Officer of SRC.

Russell Johnson — Man Vice-President

A charge that is often thrown at socialist candidates by their opponents in student elections is that by running on a broad political platform we are not relating to student interests. Where do we stand on increased university workloads, on cramped library conditions, on student housing, on the quality and cost of cafeteria food, etc, etc? Of course the Young Socialist candidates (who are, after all, students ourselves) are concerned about these questions and if elected to office would devote a good deal of our energies to furthering the immediate interests of the student body. After all, that is one of the principal reasons why a student association and a student executive exist.

But students as a whole today are interested in more than their own piece of bread and butter. They have again and again shown their concern over broad political questions such as Vietnam, apartheid and women's rights, and candidates have a duty to state where they stand on such issues. In addition to mobilising students in defence of their immediate interests, the Young Socialist candidates including myself as Man Vice President, if elected, will campaign for support for the following points:

—For a continuing campaign for the complete and unconditional US and NZ withdrawal from Southeast Asia. Stop the bombing of Cambodia. Break all NZ ties with the Saigon dictatorship. Support the July 27 antiwar picket of the Saigon embassy.

—For a women's rights university. For a free 24-hour government-financed university creche. For a women's studies course incorporated into the university curricula. Full support for the women's rights parade on Suffrage Day, September 19, demanding that abortion be a women's right to choose.

—For homosexual rights. End all discrimination against gays.

—For a university open to all. Cost of living bursaries to all students. End UE admission requirements (which, for example, prevent Maoris, Polynesian and overseas students who are not fluent in English from entering university).

Peter Rotherham — President

Members of the Young Socialists are continually being asked by students: "Why are the Young Socialists hated so much by the other student leaders?" Apart from Out political differences with these other "radicals", the answer is simply that the Young Socialists are the only organised force on campus which has been prepared to consistently stand up to the in group which currently dominates the students' association.

This point is highlighted by the fact that the Young Socialist candidates are the only candidates which are standing up against this in-group control in the current elections. Where the Young Socialists aren't running for a position, people have been elected unopposed.

This cannot simply be explained away as "student apathy". This state of affairs is, in our opinion, a direct reflection of the disgusting atmosphere which has been generated on campus this year — where virtually anyone who openly opposes the current administration runs the risk of being abused, slandered, and "trot- baited". The 1973 executive bears a large share of responsibility for this atmosphere.

A central obligation of the student president and of the student executive will be to strongly condemn this state of affairs, and campaign for a free and democratic atmosphere on campus. This does not mean that the Young Socialist candidates have no firm ideas on all the major social and political questions of today. A glance through our programme clearly indicates where we stand on a number of important issues. It does mean, however, that we will actively support the right of all students (including those we disagree with) to freely express their opinions and organise around whatever issues they choose. This stands in sharp contrast to Peter Wilson's record.

A vote for the Young Socialist candidates is a vote against the stifling atmosphere on campus and a vote for respect for the viewpoints of all students.

Peter Wilson — President

In my last Election Manifesto I made the following statement, "The past year has shown that the Students' Association cannot afford equivocating leadership. Nor on the other hand can we afford dictatorial officers. My position at all times and on all issues will be clear, but decisions on all matters of policy will be referred to SRC's and SGM's. All such policy will be upheld and enacted promptly." In fulfilling my duties as President for 1973, I have always upheld this fundamental principle and will continue to do so if re-elected. I believe this is the only way to guarantee an "open" Students' Association which docs not mean an Association whose policies find agreement among all, but one where all have the opportunity to determine what policies the Association has.

During this year the Association provided the first concrete support to student parents in the form of extra creche facilities in the Union Building. It has supported calls for the development of studies in Maori language, the environment and greater student say in the selection of law faculty staff. It has strengthened and enlarged its prerogatives in the field of the actual intellectual work students perform. The development of student groups which are considering questions such as assessment, the establishment of the "learning exchange" - this is the type of activity which shall continue to have my wholehearted support.

Similarly, student dissatisfaction with aspects of the Welfare Services in the university can only be relieved by increasing the degree of student involvement in decisions in this field. Concrete moves in this direction have already been taken. At the same time the Association and I in my capacity as President, have provided strong support for organisations such as Nga Tamatoa, the Tenants' Protection Association and the Wellington Committee on Vietnam. Because the character of the university is tightly linked to the character of the society of which it is a part, it follows that uniting the elements which are working for change in both is the only way of ultimately achieving a real transformation in either. The lack of continuity in Students' Association personnel is undoubtedly a major problem in advancing a practical strategy of this kind.

I have also chosen to stand again because the role of the universities is obviously undergoing reappraisal and change. A major educational development conference is planned for next year. It is vital that students be represented by people who can uphold their interests against the liberal-conservative consensus which, in practice, always works to the detriment of those interests in the course of making education a tougher means of enforcing the social authority of the status quo.

Finally, the unsatisfactory situation in the area of cafeteria facilities is something for which I must accept my share of responsibility. The problem has still to be effectively tackled, though the reconsideration of the catering contract which is now due, must result in improved facilities if the problem is not to be handed down from one year to the next. If I am re-elected President for 1974 I would obviously be doubly concerned to see that this did not happen.