Ethical Register
In order for any external promotions, sponsorship, or donations to be given the green light that must be checked against the UMSU Ethical Sponsorship and Advertising Policy. This is done online on our Ethical Register.
The Ethical Register is a formal record of the President and General Secretary’s approval or rejection of businesses. It tells us who UMSU can and can’t work with when it comes to advertising and sponsorship. UMSU must not engage in any type of promotion or sponsorship with a rejected business. It’s a great idea to check the Register when thinking about which businesses you’d like to receive support from.
Thinking of bringing of a specific sponsor for an event? It might be a good idea to consider the following:
- Do they have a negative environmental impact?
- Have they used exploitative labour practices?
- Do they use an excess of single use plastic in their sponsorship material?
- What's the sponsor's track record when it lawsuits / news stories?
- Do they adhere to UMSU's Financial Regulations?
If they're a big bank, multinational corporation, or accommodation suppliers there's a high chance that it will get rejected. It is also standard practice to reject external educational, employment, volunteering, accommodation, and migration agencies if we cannot verify their quality or working conditions or if it is a conflict of interest with UoM, Advocacy and Legal, or UMSU as a whole.
Google, Shop Ethical! and Ethical Consumer are all great resources.
If you find any information that might lead you to believe that the sponsor will not pass UMSU's ethical check then it might be a good idea to come up with some suitable alternatives early in the process as a longer lead time is required to land a successful sponsorship.
Note: approvals expire after 12 months.