The Martlet

According to UVic Students’ Society (UVSS) chairperson Veronica Harrison, the Canadian Federation of Students (CFS) is like a marriage. It’s the institution through which the UVSS has a relationship with other student societies across Canada. Now, some UVic students are asking for a divorce.

A petition is being circulated, asking students if they want a referendum where they will then vote on whether or not they want to continue being part of the CFS. It is the first time since UVic students voted to join the CFS in 1985 that such a question has been posed.

The petition has already reached the required number of signatures — 1,664, or 10 per cent of undergraduate students — to require a referendum. In fact, they’ve exceeded it. Jose Barrios, one of the petition’s organizers, said they are aiming for 2,000 signatures before they submit the petition to the CFS national office. From there, the CFS determines whether the petition meets the requirements stated in its bylaws and whether or not a referendum can be held.

“Due to the CFS’ aggressive litigations against any school wanting to conduct a referendum to de-federate, we will continue to collect signatures until we reach a number closer to 2,000 ... just to be safe,” Barrios wrote in an e-mail.

In 2008, the CFS was involved in legal disputes with three out of four schools who held referenda. The UVic Graduate Student Society (GSS) was the only one to avoid legal action and successfully defederate.

UVic isn’t the only school currently questioning its CFS membership, however. At least 13 other student societies across the country are circulating their own petitions.

However, Barrios suggested there may be up to 26 student societies circulating petitions. At press time, no petitions had been formally received by the CFS national office.

“This is a massive grass roots movement across the country, thousands and thousands of students are signing this petition across the country,” said Barrios. “As a matter of fact more than a thousand UVic students have already singed this petition. The numbers speak by themselves.”

Barrios hopes that by petitioning at the same time as other schools, the organizers will make it clear that the dissatisfaction with the CFS isn’t isolated to UVic students.

“There are many benefits to petitioning at the same time,” wrote Barrios. “But the most important one is that, contrary to what the CFS would like us to believe, there is a nation-wide feeling of dissatisfaction with the CFS and their inability to effectively lobby for students across the country.”

Membership — what does it get us, undergrads?

Every UVic undergrad student pays $7.98 per semester to the CFS through their UVSS fees. With more than 16,000 undergraduate students at UVic, the UVSS will send more than $200,000 in membership fees to the CFS (which includes CFS-BC) this year. In return, the CFS organizes, campaigns and lobbies at the national and provincial levels for things like lower tuition fees and better student aid.

One of the main concerns from the organizers is that students’ money could be put to better use.

“We decided to start petitioning when we became aware that the CFS gets $210,000 from us, UVic undergrads, each year,” said Barrios. “They have received literally millions of dollars from us alone, yet we are not seeing any effective lobbying being done in our behalf. We continue to pay higher and higher tuition fees year after year since we joined the CFS in 1986.”

Barrios noted that the economy is poor, and that the UVSS itself is running a deficit of $300,000.

“Why send money we don’t have to an organization that isn’t working? The money could be invested in our student society to reduce our deficit and advocate for local issues that affect everyday students in UVic,” he said.

However, others argue that there are benefits to being a member of the CFS. Harrison says that the CFS is a way for student societies to work together on collective interests.

“Essentially, those who are advocating [for] a referendum on the matter are proposing an isolationist approach under which the UVSS would cease to work together on a democratic, cooperative basis with student societies from across Canada,” she wrote in an e-mail.

Harrison said defederating would leave the UVSS with two alternatives: sit back and do nothing, hoping other student societies will do the work, or try to represent UVic students’ interests on its own.

“Obviously, the latter would be ineffective and cost prohibitive,” she said. “With respect to the former, the fewer student societies working on these issues, the less effective the national student organization will be, to the detriment of UVic students.”

CFS-BC chairperson Shamus Reid said that being members of the CFS allows UVic students to “benefit from a more affordable and higher-quality post-secondary education system.”

Reid says that decisions affecting the quality and affordability of post-secondary education are made by federal and provincial governments.

“Students need to be united and organized provincially and federally in order to have any chance of influencing these decisions,” he said. “Obviously, this costs money; and if the UVSS tried to do the work involved on its own it would cost UVic students a whole lot more money.”

Reid says through membership with the CFS, UVic students get to share this cost with more than 150,000 students across the province, and more than half a million students in Canada.

CFS-BC, the provincial component of the CFS, which is composed of 18 B.C. student unions, has an estimated revenue of $856,833.33 for 2009/2010, $725,000 of which comes from membership fees. The top-three expenses in CFS-BC’s draft budget for 2009/2010 are campaigns and government relations at $180,000, wages and benefits at $134,550 and $95,970 for executive members’ salaries and stipends.

Nicole O’Byrne, who sat on the referendum oversight committee during the GSS referendum, said their decision to defederate was almost entirely for financial reasons.

“There’s not one thing I can tell you that we got out of our membership with the CFS directly,” she said. “[We asked] ‘what are we getting for this money?’ and honestly, I can’t tell you.”

O’Byrne admitted the argument could be made that the CFS was lobbying in Ottawa on behalf of members, but added that the GSS was able to provide their own handbooks at two-thirds of what it cost to purchase them from the CFS. They were also able to make their own student cards, and arrange for their own health care plan.

Asking the question

The petition can only pose the question of defederation; from there, it’s up to the students to decide.

Harrison said a petition is only to hold a referendum, and that you can’t presuppose the outcome.

“To describe the petition as being ‘to leave the CFS’ is a mischaracterization,” Harrison said. “It may be that it is the ultimate motivation of one or more individuals, but there is no such thing as a ‘petition to leave the CFS.’”

The petitioners are also looking for students’ thoughts and opinions.

“The question for me is not one about leaving or staying, rather a question of democracy and due diligence — 1986 was the last time this question was asked of students,” said petitioner Curtis Smith. “Whether or not one feels they ought to defederate, they should support having a referendum in order to gauge the opinion of students.”

Smith believes 23 years is too long to remain a part of an organization without asking students if they still want to be in it.

“If students feel they want to stay, that’s fine, but the question must be posed to the student body,” he said.