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Tories caught meddling in student affairs - again
Well, the Tories have been caught red-handed – again – trying to interfere in student union affairs. This time, a freedom of information request uncovered correspondence between York University administrators, Conservative MPP Peter Shurman and MP Peter Kent. Kent was later found to have assigned a staff member to interfere with the election. Both politicians attempted to have the election results thrown out, despite York University administration having no evidence of wrongdoing or any authority to do so. The results showed a progressive, pro-labour, pro-Palestinian slate defeat a more right-wing slate.
This follows hot on the heels of leaked documents and recordings from Conservative strategy sessions on things like how to take over student unions, defund PIRGs, and use student groups as front groups for the party. These sessions were held across the country, in Ottawa, Toronto, London, Halifax and Winnipeg and featured a host of prominent Conservative politicians. Of course, Conservatives trying to take over student unions goes back a long way; in 2002, campus media first learned of the Millenium Leadership Fund, a secret fund used by the party to fund candidates in student union elections.
Let me be perfectly clear on this: elected politicians and representatives of the state or university administration have absolutely no business interfering in student politics. It is completely inappropriate for these people to interfere with the business of student unions. And this goes for all parties, whether they are the Conservatives with their plotting, the Liberals with CASA, or the NDP with their paternalistic attitude towards the student movement in Manitoba. It is also completely inappropriate for university administration to interfere with student union elections; that is analogous to an employer attempting to interfere with a union election.
Also highly disturbing is how these politicians have used false accusations of anti-semitism to attempt to justify their actions. These accusations are bad enough on their own as they are unfounded smears which are used to deliberately target Palestinian solidarity activists, unfairly obfuscate opposition to Zionism (itself a colonialist and racist ideology) with a form of racism, and cheapen the term anti-semitism, making it more difficult to address actual anti-semitism. But they are doubly disturbing when they are used to try to justify this sort of interference in student union elections. Recently, York and other campuses in Ontario have been relative hotbeds for Palestinian solidarity activism. This obviously rankled Peter Kent, a notorious neoconservative and staunch supporter of Israeli apartheid, not to mention the various university administrations which banned posters advertising Israeli Apartheid Week last year or have taken other actions against student anti-war and Palestinian solidarity activism.
This is not the first time Shurman has been in the news with regards to York either. During the recent strike at York University, he was prominent in calling for back to work legislation in order to crush contract faculty and teaching assistants represented by CUPE 3903. No doubt he had an interest in ensuring that a pro-labour slate would be defeated and student-labour solidarity would get knocked back a few notches.
This attempt to silence opposition is in line with a host of Conservative policies. From the slashing of funding to women’s groups and the Canadian Arab Federation to the attacks on the independence of student unions, it is clear that shutting down criticism is part and parcel of the Conservative agenda. We can see these attempts to silence opposition coupled with the policies of the government: elimination of pay equity for women, diplomatic support for the war in Gaza and increasing police state measures, and attacks on aboriginal students and cuts to the SSHRC. It’s time to build a movement, before Harper and his cronies run roughshod over Canada, destroying all the progressive legislation and social programs and whatever other ameliorations of capitalism that people have fought for over the years. This massive economic crisis may give them a chance at further implementing Shock Doctrine capitalism, but it also gives us the best chance we have had in a long time to expose the absurdities of the capitalist system and build a strong movement to oppose capitalism. Given that the economic crisis will be used to attack working class people unless there is a credible threat to state power (as in the 1930s), building resistance has to be done, and done quickly – the alternative is an incredibly brutal intensification of capitalism and other forms of oppression.
Brian Latour is a student, activist, and student activist living in Winnipeg. Read more by Brian Latour.
