Tuesday 10-12-2019 - 16:36

With the General Election coming in fast (Thursday 12 December), your Student Officers have sent a letter to all candidates in the Manchester Central constituency. The Union have been finding out what issues are most important to Manchester Met students in this election, and asked those questions directly to the candidates.

Those candidates are:

John Bridges (Liberal Democrats)
Sarah Jane Chadwick (The Brexit Party)
Melanie Jane Horrocks (Green Party)
Shaden Jaradat (Conservative Party)
Dennis Leech (Socialist Equality Party)
Lucy Powell (Labour)

The letter detailed:

"Dear Candidate, 

We are writing to you from Manchester Metropolitan Students’ Union as the elected representatives of the 38,000 students at Manchester Metropolitan University. We want to enquire about your views on the most important issues for students ahead of the upcoming election on 12 December. As a candidate running to be MP for Manchester Central — where our campus-based students live — if elected, you will represent thousands of students and so we want to make sure that you will represent our views. Having the support of this group of students will also be essential for you getting elected.

For just under half of our members, this general election will be the first time that they will have ever voted in a national poll. Whilst we recognise that party policy is decided at a national level, the views of local candidates will be very important to inform students ahead of polling day. With that in mind, we have consulted with our members on what issues they would like to speak to local candidates about.

We have attached a document containing the issues we are interested in and would be most grateful if you could reply to this detailing:
•    Whether you agree that this policy should be implemented by the next government and if not why not. 
•    How you can demonstrate your commitment to this policy.
•    Whether you commit to voting in favour of this policy should you be elected as our MP.

Please do fill this in for policies that you feel you are able to answer. We plan to publish your answers, including any non-answers, to our members so they may be informed of your views and we will take your reply as an indication of your consent for us to do so.

We would be happy to answer any questions you may have or to provide further information on any of these policies.

We look forward to hearing from you.

Kind Regards,

Elected Officer Team
The Union, Manchester Metropolitan University"
 

PDF copy

 

 

Wellbeing Officer Andy Harmon says ‘Asking candidates what they think about issues in your local community is the best way to inform your vote’. We will update this article with any responses we receive.

Response from Dennis Leech

Response from Melanie Jane Horrocks