Paraic McLean has been issued a minor strike for breaching the rules of the Trinity College Dublin Students’ Union (TCDSU) elections.
Paul Molloy was also issued a fine for having a campaign poster hung up in the wrong area. David Flood was also issued a fine this afternoon by the Electoral Commission.
McLean was issued a minor strike because a member of his campaign team is not a fully registered student.
The Electoral Commission decided to issue a minor strike to McLean after a meeting this afternoon. Fifteen t-shirts will also be confiscated from McLean for campaigning tomorrow. The Electoral Commission decided that both Flood and Molloy will not be allowed to campaign on campus tomorrow in the Arts Block or Hamilton Building tomorrow between 2pm and 3pm, extending their lunch breaks by an hour.
McLean is one of three candidates running for the position of Communications and Marketing Officer of TCDSU. He is the second candidate to be issued a strike. On Monday, Niall Harty was issued a minor strike before campaigning began. Harty is also a candidate in the communications and marketing race.
In an email statement to The University Times, McLean’s campaign manager Sean O’Carroll said: “We had a meeting with an EC this evening where we were given a minor strike for a breach of Schedule 3 as a member of our campaign team was not a registered student.”
“The student in question has yet to hand in the final draft of their thesis and is due to graduate in April 2018 so we were not aware that they were no longer a registered student. Once it was brought to our attention by the EC they stopped campaigning for us. It’s an honest mistake, but these things happen so we are happy to comply with the EC’s ruling”, he said.
In an email to The University Times Molloy said that one of his campaign team member’s placed the poster on the wrong board by mistake and said that he was “very sorry for doing so”.
In an email statement to The University Times, Flood’s campaign manager, Conor Gill, said: “Unfortunately someone on the campaign team put up a poster on non-SU noticeboard.”
“However, this will allow us to schedule more of our campaign team in off-campus locations such as D’Olier Street and the TBSI”, Gill added.
Flood, a third-year mechanical engineering student, is one of two candidates running for the position of Entertainments Officer of TCCDSU.
Molloy is one of four presidential candidates running in this year’s elections and is Auditor of the College Historical Society (the Hist). This is the second breach of election rules for Molloy. Two weeks before campaigning began, a member of his campaign team was found in breach of campaigning rules, after they posted in a class Facebook page about Molloy running for the role of president.
The rules for candidates and their campaigns are set out in schedule three of TCDSU’s constitution. Where a candidate breaches one of those rules the Electoral Commission will decide whether to issue a strike. Under these rules three minor rule breaches or two major rule breaks will result in the candidate being struck from the ballot.
Ciaran Molloy and Dominic McGrath also contributed reporting to this piece.
