Ten student unions across the country have signed an open letter to the Canadian Federation of Students (CFS) calling for greater transparency and accountability from the organization. The student unions include the Carleton University Students’ Association (CUSA), and the Ryerson Students’ Union (RSU).
On Sept. 19, each of the ten student unions published a letter to the CFS in which they voiced numerous concerns regarding the organization, including “extreme difficulty of accessing information” and “the exclusive nature of general meetings.”
The letter was published ahead of the CFS Annual National General Meeting taking place in November.
Founded in 1981 at Carleton, the CFS is the largest student organization in Canada. Working to lobby the federal and provincial governments in support of student issues, the CFS also provides member local unions with advocacy campaign material on a variety of different issues, such as consent culture and access to education.
CUSA pays the federation about $390,000 per year, funded by a student levy of $16.24 per student, according to CUSA vice-president (finance) David Andrews.
Carleton University
CUSA president Fahd Alhattab said that “the letter very clearly says that we are in support of a nation-wide students’ federation.”
However, he added, “it’s our responsibility to hold them accountable.”
In the letter to the CFS, the student unions criticized the federation for a “lack of space for dissent and constructive criticism.” Alhattab said CUSA was “attacked” by “CFS supporters” after sending out the letter publicly.
“Even though it’s a constructive letter . . . a lot of other member groups kind of turned the finger and said ‘CUSA does this and this,’ trying to point out our mistakes,” he said. “We have our own share of mistakes . . . that does not mean we can’t help and improve the [CFS].”
Alhattab also said CFS financial statements are difficult to access.
“They only have two general meetings a year, and that’s the only times they give us access to the finances . . . having those online would be very key,” Alhattab said.
Ryerson University
“We have been fighting year after year,” said Victoria Morton, vice-president (education) of the RSU in Toronto.
“The CFS hasn’t been reaching its goals, and we have made attempts to work better with the CFS, but they’ve never been met with action,” Morton said. “Now we’re just at the point where we have to band together with other student unions to force the CFS to change for the better.”
University of British Columbia
Tensions have been building among members of the CFS in British Columbia, who are seeking to defederate from the national CFS following a unanimous no confidence vote at their 2015 Semi-Annual General Meeting. CFS-BC member local unions have voted unanimously to censure the CFS National Executive, and have voiced concerns of election fraud at the 2015 National Aboriginal Caucus General Meeting.
“For us, it has been years of frustration with the organization, its transparency, and its level of services,” said Blake Edwards, president of the University of British Columbia-Okanagan Students’ Union. “The conversation has been building for a while, and we’ve been able to put a collective voice behind the issues we have all been identifying.”
Cape Breton University
Roy Karam, president of the Cape Breton University Students’ Union (CBUSU), said that his organization signed the letter in an effort to express their concerns “on the un-democratic process that the CFS operates in” regarding defederation. In 2008, CBUSU held a referendum to defederate from the CFS.
The CFS sued the union for attempting to leave the federation, and CBUSU was ordered to pay the federation damages of $295,000 in 2015, according to CBC. The court ruled in favour of the CFS because the CBUSU did not follow proper procedure in the referendum.
“That referendum was not recognized by CFS, to say the least,” Karam said. “We’ll be presenting an entire reform package to the CFS at the national general meeting, which will consist of a number of motions to change the bylaws in their governing documents to make it easier to leave or join if students wish to do so.”
The student union and CFS were able to reach an out-of-court agreement earlier this year, but the CBUSU is still part of the federation.
University of Regina
However, not all signatories of the letter are interested in defederating from the CFS.
“We do support the actions of the CFS, and we believe in a national movement,” said Shawn Wiskar, vice-president (student affairs) at the University of Regina Students’ Union. “However, the Saskatchewan component of the CFS in the last couple years has been basically non-existent.”
“We believe that if we can ask for these national reforms along with all these other universities, it may help our component itself operate more smoothly,” Wiskar added.
CFS response
Bilan Arte, national chairperson of the CFS, said that she was “very saddened” to hear that members had not felt welcome at CFS meeting spaces and was “looking forward” to speaking with members to improve the situation at the November meeting.
Looking to “correct the record,” Arte added that the open letter “makes an assumption that our governing documents . . . are not available online. It also says that our minutes weren’t available online, and that is untrue. Our constitution and our bylaws, our operational policy and our issue-based policy have been online for years now.”
Gayle McFadden, national executive representative for CFS-Ontario, said “we should be comfortable being critical of our student movement.”
“We appreciate that these critiques and concerns are being brought forward,” McFadden said. “Otherwise, we wouldn’t be growing.”
In response to CUSA’s signing of the letter, Arte and McFadden responded with their own letter stating that they “take seriously the issues raised and commit to working . . . to ensure concerns are addressed.”
