Litigation has commenced for collection of CFS membership fees
Few could have predicted back in 2010, when Central Student Association (CSA) was still trying to dissolve its relationship with the Canadian Federation of Students (CFS) and the Canadian Federation of Students-Ontario (CFS-O), that just four years later the three organizations would be involved in a joint lawsuit against the university.
But on March 21, lawyers representing the CSA, CFS and CFS-O submitted a notice of application to the Superior Court of Justice in Ottawa against the University of Guelph, thereby commencing the legal proceedings.
The CSA is a seeking a mandatory order requiring the U of G to collect CFS and CFS-O membership fees from the CSA membership (undergraduate students) for the 2013-2014 academic year, and for so long as the CSA continues to remain a member of the CFS and CFS-O. The CSA is also seeking mandatory order requiring the U of G to remit those CFS and CFS-O membership fees it collected on behalf of the CSA during the 2010-2011 and 2011-2012 academic years, but were withheld due to the uncertainty surrounding the decertification referendum.
The CFS and CFS-O are both seeking damages against the university, which combined total more than half a million dollars, that are the result of the university not collecting membership fees for the 2012-2013 and 2013-2014 academic years. It is also seeking five per cent interest on the amount claimed in the application.
In essence, the application charges that the university intentionally induced a breach of contract between the CSA and the CFS/CFS-O by refusing to collect or remit membership fees. It says that the university unlawfully interfered with the contractual relations between the CSA and CFS/CFS-O, resulting in damages and losses.
The application also affirms that the CSA Board of Directors is empowered to make decisions about whether to stay or leave the CSF and CFS-O, without recourse to referendum.
The university has maintained throughout that students have more than once expressed their desire to leave the CFS and CFS-O: once during the 2010 referendum – the results of which the CFS and CFS-O successfully appealed in court – and again during a 2013 survey when students again voted in favour of the leaving the CFS and CFS-O. During those years, the university, which collects the CFS and CFS-O memberships fees for the CSA, held the fees in trust.
But by 2012, the CSA Board of Directors determined that it would rather settle its dispute with the CFS and CFS-O than fight on. In November, the CSA asked the university to continue to collect the CFS membership fees and remit the fees it had collected for the past two years. The university did not do so. The lawsuit claims this action damaged the three student organizations.
In April 2013, the CSA and CFS/CFS-O formally entered into a so-called litigation cooperation agreement. The agreement states that CSA and CFS/CFS-O will work cooperatively and jointly together in the preparation, filing and prosecution of a legal proceeding where they will seek relief for the membership fees the university is withholding and refusing to collect.
The CSA and the university also engaged in a process of mediation off and on during the intervening period, but to no avail. The university has repeatedly offered to assist the CSA in a legal battle against CFS and CFS-O, but the CSA has so far refused the offer.
The dispute has now entered into a new phase of formal litigation.
The university says it has not yet had a chance to review the notice of application in detail and so is unable to comment on its merits at this time.
The CSA released an update on the dispute on March 26, announcing that “a judge appointed by the Courts will act as an external independent arbitrator” in the dispute, but did not clarify the process further.
Students should note that the lawsuit should not be confused with an arbitration tribunal – which Student Life’s Student Organization Policy provides rules for – but is, in fact, a real lawsuit.