Well, it's that time of year again: the Canadian Federation of Students (CFS) is holding its Annual General Meeting from Tuesday, May 31st to Friday, June 3rd, 2011 somewhere in the national capital.
I would like to immediately start by raising a red flag pertaining to a motion that is truly disturbing: the University of Toronto Students' Union (Local 98) has introduced 2011/05:N15 Motion to amend bylaws (which can be found in the above agenda on page 9).
Furthermore, I have typed out the entire motion below and added emphasis on the particularly troubling areas that seem to be, in my opinion, giving complete power of all future referendums (both to adhere to and defederate from) on CFS membership to the Federation's National Executive.
As it currently stands, whenever a referendum is held at any post-secondary education institution to either adhere to or defederate from the CFS, a committee known as the Referendum Oversight Committee (hereafter referred to as ROC) is immediately formed in order to, well, oversee the all aspects of the referendum. According to Bylaw 1, Section 4.b of the CFS Constitution and Bylaws (page 19), this committee is "composed of two (2) members appointed by the prospective local association and two (2) members appointed by the Federation"
This committee is responsible for the following (as per Bylaw 1, Section 4.i through 4viii):
i. establishing the notice requirement for the vote in accordance with Section 4-c of this Bylaw and ensuring that notice is posted.Along with the following added responsibilities (as per Bylaw 1, Section 6 [Vote to Decertify] - 6.c.vii and 6.c.vii):
ii. establishing the campaign period in accordance with Section 4-d of this Bylaw.
iii. approving all campaign materials in accordance with Section 4-e of this Bylaw and removing campaign materials that have not been approved.
iv. deciding the number and location of polling stations.
v. setting the hours of voting in accordance with Section 4-f of this Bylaw.
vi. overseeing all aspects of the voting.
vii. counting the ballots following the vote.
viii. establishing all other rules and regulations for the vote.
vi. tabulating the votes cast;Once again, below you will find the Local 98's motion that would completely overhaul the current oversight of the Federation's referendum:
vii. adjudicating all appeals
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2011/05:N15 MOTION TO AMEND BYLAWS
Local 98 – University of Toronto Students’ Union/
Whereas the York Federation of Students recently had a review of its elections policy conducted by Davis LLP; and
Whereas David compared the York Federation of Students procedure to that used by other students’ unions as well as by Elections Canada; and
Whereas the report emphasised the importance of a streamlined voting process with decisions vested in one individual empowered to supervise the election; and
Whereas almost, if not all, students’ unions in Canada have a chief returning officer who is principally in charge of overseeing elections and referenda; and
Whereas having such an officer, who is responsible for overseeing all aspects of the vote, and is accountable to the membership through their elected National Executive, will increase transparency and accountability; therefore
Be it resolved that Bylaw 1, Article 4.b be struck and replaced with:
b. Chief Returning Officer
The referendum shall be overseen by a Chief Returning Officer appointed by the National Executive, who shall be responsible for:
i. establishing the notice requirement for the referendum in accordance with Section 4-c of this Bylaw and ensuring that notice is posted,
ii. establishing the campaign period in accordance with Section 4-d of this Bylaw,
iii. approving all campaign materials in accordance with Section 4-e of this Bylaw and removing campaign materials that have not been approved,
iv. deciding the number and location of polling stations,
v. setting the hours of voting in accordance with Section 4-f of this Bylaw,
vi. overseeing all aspects of the voting,
vii. establishing all other rules and regulations for the vote,
Be if further resolved that Bylaw 1, Article 4.e.v be amended to read:
v. Campaign materials shall not be misleading, defamatory or false. The Chief Returning Officer shall be the sole arbiter of whether materials are misleading, defamatory or false.
Be it further resolved that Bylaw 1, Article 4.h be amended to read:
h. Appeals
Any appeals of the referendum results or rulings by the Chief Returning Officer shall be adjudicated by the Federation’s National Executive.
Be it further resolved that Bylaw 1, Article 6.c be amended to read:
c. Chief Returning Officer
The referendum shall be overseen by a Chief Returning Officer appointed by the National Executive, who shall be responsible for:
i. establishing the notice requirement for the referendum in accordance with Section 4-c of this Bylaw and ensuring that notice is posted,
ii. establishing the campaign period in accordance with Section 4-d of this Bylaw,
iii. approving all campaign materials in accordance with Section 4-e of this Bylaw and removing campaign materials that have not been approved,
iv. deciding the number and location of polling stations
v. setting the hours of voting in accordance with Section 4-f of this Bylaw,
vi. overseeing all aspects of the voting,
vii. counting the ballots following the vote,
viii. establishing all other rules and regulations for the vote
Be it further resolved that Bylaw 1, Article 6.f.v be amended to read:
v. Campaign materials shall not be misleading defamatory or false. The Chief Returning Officer shall be the sole arbiter of whether materials are misleading, defamatory or false.
Be it further resolved that Bylaw 1, Article 6.i be amended to read:
i. Appeals
Any appeals of the referendum results or rulings by the Chief Returning Officer shall be adjudicated by the Federation’s National Executive.
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To make a long story short, this motion would essentially eliminate the current oversight body, the ROC, and replace it with a single Chief Returning Officer that would be appointed by the Federation's National Executive. This person would have all the same responsibilities as the ROC currently has.
However, this motion removes the local association's ability to even out the playing field if (and I mean this would never, EVER happen) the person appointed by the National Executive happened to be biased towards the pro-CFS camp.
Many examples exist of dysfunctional ROCs but I will simply point out one of the more recent cases, which I covered extensively on this blog, involving the University of Regina Students' Union (URSU). You can view my blog postings on that failure of a referendum by clicking on the links bellow:
University of Regina's Referendum on Continued Membership in the CFS ends today
WTF: U of R referendum results?
UPDATE - WTF: URSU referendum results
Une semaine plus tard...
UPDATE #2 - WTF: URSU referendum results
Then, on December 15th 2010, a confidentiality agreement along with a joint letter were signed by each party's legal counsel which further delayed the release of the results until certain prerequisites had been met to the satisfaction of both parties.
By March 7th, 2011, the URSU was served with this letter from CFS's legal counsel warning it that if the two parties could not come to an agreement on a joint announcement of the referendum results, the CFS would unilaterally release them on March 9th, 2011.
Then, on March 9th 2011, CFS's legal counsel once again served URSU with this letter which extended the original deadline, that was to have expired on that very day, to noon on March 10th, 2011. The URSU responded with this press release questioning the CFS's motivation behind the release of the results without first having dealt with any and all remaining issues, as per the December 15th agreement.
And finally, on March 10th 2011, CFS chair, Dave Molenhuis, served this letter to the URSU, partially in response to the URSU's press release from the day before, but mainly to unilaterally release the referendum results. The URSU quickly responded with this press release expressing its disappointment in regards to the CFS's unilateral release of the referendum results and thus ignoring the unresolved issues that remained.
Following the release of the referendum results, the URSU's former President, Kyle Addison, and First Nations University Student Association's President, Jesse Robson, released a joint statement on March 14th, 2011 which essentially explained the whole controversy surrounding the referendum on continued membership in CFS and attempted to display that both organizations remained allies despite the recent turmoil caused by the confusion surrounding voter eligibility.
Lastly, the former URSU executive did the responsible thing by releasing the cost of the entire referendum process: "The total costs of Administrative, Legal, Campaign personnel and material was $64,002.13." The communique also "urges the CFS to follow suit by disclosing their expense amounts from the Local 9 referendum." Unfortunately, to my knowledge, the CFS has failed to release these costs.
As much as the current process may be slightly imperfect (listen to the In Brief podcast at the bottom of this post to better understand the main issues with the ROC at the U of R), eliminating the ROC, in my opinion, is taking the easy way out. Obviously, with 2 members being appointed by the CFS National Executive and 2 members being appointed by the Local association, the potential for gridlock to arise is apparent. However, simply giving the oversight powers to one individual, appointed by the CFS National Executive enables an amount of centralization which would almost definitely ensure an abuse of power thus leading to more legal battles. It's not the right answer and I would strongly suggest that the SFUO delegation think twice before supporting such a simplistic approach to reforming the medium by which future CFS referendums will be overseen.
