Consume REST service in MVC

See more:

C#

MVC5

My Base class:

public class GlobalVariables
   {
       public static HttpClient client = new HttpClient();

       public GlobalVariables()
       {
           client.BaseAddress = new Uri("http://localhost:8080");
           client.DefaultRequestHeaders.Clear();
           client.DefaultRequestHeaders.Accept.Add(new System.Net.Http.Headers.MediaTypeWithQualityHeaderValue("application/xml"));
       }
   }

My Controller:

[HttpGet]
        public ActionResult GetById()
        {
            IEnumerable<StudentViewModel> list;
            HttpResponseMessage response = GlobalVariables.client.GetAsync("/System_Users").Result;
            list = response.Content.ReadAsAsync<IEnumerable<StudentViewModel>>().Result;
            return View(list);
        }

I get the following error:

System.InvalidOperationException: 'An invalid request URI was provided. The request URI must either be an absolute URI or BaseAddress must be set.'

What I have tried:

I have tried adding an @ sign I have also tried adding the full url's in both my base class and controllers