Slogan: Let’s make the USU for you!
Colour: Orange
Faction: Independent
Degree: PPE I
Quiz Score: 14%
Favourite USU venue on Campus: Fisher Cafe
Biggest Campus Pet Peeve: No Pet Peeves
Most Toxic Trait: Overthinking
Favourite Bathroom to ‘go piss girl’ on Campus: Any bathroom
Lachlan Mansour is a first-year student who is making some unusual moves in this election. He has no campaign manager — telling Honi that “I’d probably have to pay them and I’d rather just do it all myself” — and he is the only candidate whose slogan doesn’t have his own name in it. There are no other first years running for the Board we interviewed, so Mansour also brings a fresh lack of experience to the table.
Mansour has been a controversial candidate in the USU Board elections due to his heavy emphasis on Christianity. Mansour only provided Honi three policies, and he scored the lowest result of all the candidates in Honi’s quiz, receiving only 14 per cent.
He had a shallow understanding of voluntary student unionism, guessing that it involved “student action” and that it was introduced sometime in the 20th century. He did not provide any correct answers about recent higher education legislation, had dismal knowledge about FoodHub and the clubs funding system, and could not name any autonomous spaces on campus. Across all sections of the quiz, Mansour’s knowledge and understanding of campus was extremely limited, but he consistently justified this by saying that he was “only in first year”.
Mansour is unaffiliated with any faction, proclaiming “I am my faction.” He is formerly a member of the Family First party, and identified his politics as economically centrist and socially conservative. He did not align with any major parties on social politics, and cited his preference for Family First as due to their “more moderated [sic] stance” on economic policies compared to other minor parties.
Mansour said that he had no opinion on USU incorporation because he did not have an awareness of the “AGM” or what was voted on, saying that “I haven’t had much time to look into it… [I have] been preoccupied.”
With the typical enthusiasm of a first year, Mansour is a member of many societies. He is involved in the Conservative Club and the USyd Orthodox Christian Fellowship, and has not held any executive positions. He cited his position as SRC representative in Year 11 and as school captain at his Greek Orthodox high school as evidence of his leadership experience.
One thing that Mansour does have in common with other candidates is the desire to make food on campus cheaper. He said that knowledge of the USU’s revenue “will come in due time”. Commenting on his policies, Mansour said that “all of them are quite ambitious” and that he would “rely a lot on consulting”.
Mansour’s tactic is to increase support for charities such as EatUp Australia, although his policies do not mention FoodHub. He said that he was “all for” increasing funding for FoodHub, but that “we need to provide for the rest of the community”.
One of Mansour’s policies is to increase representation of Christians on the Board. Although the number of people identifying as Christians in Australia has declined in recent years while atheism has risen, Mansour believes that people on the USU Board will “have some sort of ideological inclinations” and that “someone like me” is needed to “balance” the USU. He said that it would be helpful to have “at least one person”. Bryson Constable, the current USU President, is a Christian.
When questioned about equivalent measures to increase representation of Muslims or atheists, Mansour said that it would “get very complicated”.
Regarding the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions against Israel movement, Mansour said that he takes “a balanced approach on the Israel-Palestine conflict” and that he believes in the two-state solution. He added, “Israel has the right to defend itself.”
Mansour did not know who the USU VTeam was, and had “no comments” on whether they should be paid. He said that the USU service he engaged with most frequently was FoodHub “so I can get my matcha latte”, although he seems to have gotten this confused with another service. Mansour was unable to identify the 5-item limit at FoodHub, and incorrectly guessed its operating hours. He also had not heard of the Campus Access Policy.
Honi wonders if Mansour possesses a delusional amount of self-confidence or whether he received a mandate from God? We cannot think of any other reason why he would embark on such a slapdash campaign.
