awsuit Against
SSU Students’
nion Sets
=recedent for

FS Deali ngs
Jeanette Stewart, CUP Central Bureau Chief

GINA (CUP)—Those following the case
lave hailed the success of a recent lawsuit filed
ty Robin Mowat against the University of
askatchewan Students’ Union as a precedent-
etting decision.

The lawsuit has shed light on the problems
rith the Canadian Federation of Students (CFS)
erendum policies, says Joey Coleman, a blog-

fer and student politics devotee at McMaster
)niversity who has been following the case
om the start.

Other students will point to this and go ‘The
roblems with your rules and the way you run
erendums have been noted by the court’,”

hid Coleman.

In his Oct. 13 judgment, Judge R.S. Smith
bund “The referendum held by the USSU on
he issue of whether it should join the CFS is of
bsolutely no force or effect.” No damages or
bsts were awarded.

The original suit was named only the USSU,

t the CFS was later added, at its own request,
s a respondent.

And although the USSU is planning to

ppeal the decision should the CFS decide to do

 

so, Coleman says it still sends a clear message
about the way CFS runs its referendums.

“T believe it’s very much a landmark. This has
put the CFS on notice that they can’t just over-
rule and override to have their way,” he said.

However, Alice Collins, vice-president exter-
nal of the USSU and CFS Saskatchewan repre-
sentative, says the issue lies more with the USSU
than the CFS.

“T think a lot of the reason why people were
opposed to the CFS afterwards is because they
complained about the process of the referen-
dum,” she said.

Currently, CFS policy dictates that when a
students’ union wants to hold a referendum, the
policies and bylaws of that students’ union must
be suspended and a referendum oversight com-
mittee struck. This committee has to be com-
posed of two members of CFS and two mem-
bers of the students’ union.

This usually goes unchallenged, but in the
case of USSU, which has its own referendum
bylaws, an independent elections board was cre-
ated to oversee the referendum.

After the referendum, the elections board

declared the referendum invalid. The USSU
decided to overlook this decision and ratify the
results, declaring the USSU full CFS members.

There is indication in the Mar. 30, 2006,
board meeting minutes that the USSU felt pres-
sure from the CFS to ratify the results.

Gavin Gardiner, the CFS Saskatchewan rep-
resentative at the time, asked the council to con-
sider how a lawsuit from the CFS would impact
the USSU.

Amanda Aziz, CFS national chairperson, says
the CFS is “not in the practice” of suing stu-
dents’ unions.

Mowat, a former U of S student and USSU
president, brought the suit against the students’
union because as a member of the union, he felt
that the rules that were in place to “protect and
empower” the members were breached.

“At certain times . . . they will be inconven-
ient. That doesn’t mean you can just ignore
them because they are inconvenient,” said
Mowat.

Mowat’s statements echo the judge’s Oct. 13
ruling,

“When faced with a result which was not
consistent with its wishes, the University
Students’ Council simply ignored its own rules
and imposed its own preordained outcome,”
wrote Smith.

Students at the U of S aren’t alone in taking
issue with this policy, but Mowat is one of the
first students to take his protests to the courts.

The University of Manitoba students’ union
also held a referendum to join the CFS in
November 2005, and it passed without much
question by students.

An editorial appeared in the Manitoban
newspaper questioning the policies, and an arti-
cle ran after the vote in which a student ques-
tioned the referendum and the ability of the
four members of the oversight committee to

 

count 30,000 ballots in a single night.

Little came of the criticisms.

At the University of Toronto, a referendum
was held in 2003 to determine whether the
Students’ Administrative Council would join the
CES.

There a referendum took place according to
CFS rules, and a majority vote was attained.

U of T administration later took issue with
the vote, stating that a “significant number of
violations of bylaw requirements” led to an
inability to verify the referendum.

Students at the U of T had concerns, and
wrote several letter to campus paper the Varsity.

While students may question the policies for
a short time after a referendum, it’s often diffi-
cult to have enough time and resources to take
on their own students’ union, let alone the CFS,
says Coleman.

“To oppose the CFS at that level is difficult,”
said Coleman.

Usually those students who are in a position
to do so are near graduation and it really isn’t
worth it for them.

“You really have to weigh the personal sacri-
fice,” he said.

Kathleen Wilson, vice-president (external)
with the University of Regina students’ union
and a CFS provincial representative, says nothing
like this has ever happened before.

If the USSU does not become members, the
CFS stands to lose approximately $160,000 in
membership fees annually, approximately 19,500
students, and the support of the largest universi-
ty in Saskatchewan.

“Tt’s definitely a setback,” said Wilson. “It’s
really beneficial, especially for students at U of
R, to have U of S at the table too. United under
CFS the last few years they've accomplished a
lot and we really want to see that go forward.”

 

Students Petition for Impeachment of Student Union

J.J. McCullough, OP Contributor

ctober 26, 2006
small group of self-declared “concerned stu-
ents” have initiated a formal drive to impeach
directors of the Douglas College Student’s
nion, citing various allegations of corruption
d mismanagement. For the last week, a table
as been set up in the main concourse of the
tew Westminster campus, as organizers of the
hovement actively solicit students to sign a
etition that would serve as the first formal
ep towards impeachment.
Like most student unions, the
jouglas College Student Union is a registered
pciety under the Society Act of British
olumbia, a piece of legislation passed by the
[DP government in 1996 to help enforce cer-
standards of accountability and member
ghts for all registered non-profit organizations
the province. Under the terms of that legis-
tion the collective “membership” of any soci-
holds the right to demand a general meeting
its society at any time, so long as a valid
petition, certifying at least 10% of the mem-
ers favor such a move, can be obtained.
At present, the DSU impeachment
ptition is said to contain over 500 names, As
1 enrolled students of Douglas College are
gally considered “members” of the Students’
inion, the impeachment organizers will have
achieve at least double that number in order
register 10% of Douglas’ population, which
presently estimated at approximately 8,500.
ce that milestone is reached, and the validity

pnewseditor@gmail.com

 

of all signatures confirmed, the DSU executive
will be forced to call a general meeting. At least
75 Douglas students must then attend, in order
to meet quorum. If the impeachment initiative
continues as planned, the meeting will then
conclude with two-thirds of the members pres-
ent voting to approve a special resolution to
impeach all 10 elected members of the DSU
Representative Committee (the union’s main
decision-making body). Of course, some hope
it may not have to come to that. “I’m hoping
that when the DSU sees the petition, and the
will of the students it represents, it will inspire
them to resign,” said one leading impeachment
organizer, who asked not to be named.

Such impeachment proponents, for
their part, have denied their efforts are motivat-
ed by anything other than a genuine interest in
holding the Union accountable for past actions.
“Tt’s not personal” another anonymous mem-
ber assured. Most members have expressed a
desire to stay anonymous, stating fears of DSU
“retaliation.” They do claim, however, that no
past or present DSU office-holders are associ-
ated with the impeachment drive, and instead
characterize their movement as a group that
just “naturally happened” in response to a
shared frustration with the conduct of the stu-
dents’ union.

As a way of soliciting student signa-
tures, the group has been distributing leaflets
that provide students with a damning list of
“things you may not know” about the DSU.

The leaflets chronicle a number of the now-
common allegations of financial mismanage-
ment that have been leveled against the Union
in the last few months. Indeed, most of these
allegations appear to be lifted directly from the
DSU’s own 2006 financial audit, a document
which the Douglas College Board of Directors
has continued to cite as justification for sus-
pending funds to the Student Union.
According to the impeachment organizers, two
student reps from the College Board are back-
ing the initiative, though the collective board
itself, and by extension the college administra-
tion, is officially neutral.

The DSU Representative Committee
has not yet formally expressed an opinion on
the impeachment effort. When asked to com-
ment, Chris Sleightholme, the Committee’s
elected Pride Liaison, said he was encouraged
to see students showing an active interest in
Student Union politics, but cautioned that his
organization’s members were not yet united
behind any coherent plan of what, if anything,
their formal response to the initiative will ulti-
mately be.

November 3, 2006
Completed Petition Puts Impeachment
Ball in DSU’s Court

The Douglas College Students’ Union
has confirmed that on the evening of October
31 a completed petition of impeachment was

formally presented to the main society office.
Union officials must now formally verify the
approximately 1000 names contained in the list,
cross-checking to confirm that every individual
who signed the petition is a registered student
of Douglas College, and thus a “member in
good standing” of the DSU.

The DSU Representative Committee
has still not officially weighed in on the initia-
tive that seeks to remove them from office.
There had been expectations that the matter
would be addressed at the committee’s
November first board meeting, but due to
“quotum issues” the scheduled meeting never
actually occurred.

Officials at the students’ union con-
tacted by the Other Press predicted it would
likely not take more than a few days to verify all
the names on the impeachment petition. If that
is the case, and the petition is found to be valid,
the Representative Committee could be forced
to call a special general meeting as early as
November 8th, their next scheduled board
meeting. Choosing the precise date of the
SGM will be the prerogative of the Rep
Committee, though according to the terms of
the 1996 Society Act, the meeting must be
called no later than three weeks after the “deliv-
ery of the requisition,” or in this case the peti-
tion. If a meeting is not called before
November 21, the act allows the petitioners to
take matters into their own hands, and organize
a meeting at a time of their own choosing,

3