Current VP Communities Justine Pédussel has put her hat in the ring for Union President in 2025/26.
Her role as Student Housing Officer in 2023 carried into VP Communities with ongoing work to include students in the Housing Bill 2025.
Pédussel’s manifesto focuses on continuing to improve student housing, accessibility for disabled students, and cost-of-living crisis support.
Background
Housing has been key to Pédussel’s work in the Students’ Union. She co-founded the National Union of Students’ (NUS) National Student Housing Campaign, where she is working on the Housing Bill 2025.
She also created a “Know Your Rights” booklet with basic employment and tenancy rights. This is available in the Students’ Union office, but Pédussel aims to edit it and make it widely accessible online as the Union President.
Last year, she revived Stirling’s Climate Festival and organised Housing Week at Stirling, which included campaigning at Holyrood.
She also proposed the passed Positive Campus Employment Motion, which demands that the University ammend contracts for on-campus shops to discourage zero-hour contracts, fire-and-rehire practices, and pay the Real Living Wage.
During her time at Stirling, she has also been active in societies such as the Law Society and Solidarity Space.
Why Run for Union President?
Simply, the remit for Union President is different than VP Communities’. Pédussel says, “I want to focus on equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI) and those kinds of campaigns”.
The Union President is also a more politically active role than VP Communities, requiring work with governing bodies.
The Students’ Union defines the role: “The Union President is the political lead of the organisation, representing students’ interests to University staff, local and national Government and within the National Union of Students.”
On the other hand, the VP Communities focuses on the student body, Societies, housing, sustainability, and volunteering.
She reflects: “I just won’t be able to do any better than what I’m doing this year [as VP Communities]. And because of that, I think that somebody else who will do better should be have the opportunity to do it.”
Support for Disabled Students
Pédussel’s priority is increasing accessibility for disabled students, “which leads to broader inclusion in general,” she says.
She continues: “If you don’t have the support that you need in order to do your assessments or to go to class, there’s just no way that you can do it.
“It hits disabled students significantly harder than it would for other students, even if the support system and the support services that exist for both are very similar.”
Pédussel stated that she has a disability but has also been working with the Disability Students Association of Stirling (DSAS) on her aims.
Cost-of-Living Crisis
Pédussel hopes that the Housing Bill 2025 will see advancement by the end of her term as VP Communities, improving student’s tenancy rights.
Her next focus would be related to rising energy costs, which also has a Bill going through the Scottish Government.
She also wants to tackle issues with the University’s financial support mechanisms, which have discouraged students with allegedly insensitive questions. The Union are currently working with the University to edit these questionnaires.
“And so ensuring that those systems work is a really good start, and then looking at tackling food.”
She floated ideas of regular free meals on campus for students in need, saying “I’m not entirely sure how I’d go about that, but I didn’t know how I’d go about solving housing either.”
What sets Pédussel’s campaign apart?
Pédussel has proven experience in advocating for students, covering housing, transport, employment and food issues. She tells Brig “I’ve shown that I can get things done.
“I’ve set out to solve the housing crisis and the Bill is going to include students in a positive way, not just to exclude them, for the first time in like ever.”
She continues, “The microwave on campus, that’s something I did, the fact that you can change your pronouns on Teams, the fact that we’ve got bus screens where you can look at the bus timetable.”
“If I can’t get it done in one way, I’ll just do it a different way.”
Also in the running for Union President are Joshua Parsonage, Chair of the Stirling Scottish Socialist Youth and Postgraduate Volunteer Officer John Adithya.
Voting for Stirling’s Student Union Elections opens on February 25 and closes on February 27. With results announced on February 28.
Featured Image Credit: University of Stirling
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