UMSU Notes

UMSU finds Canadian Blood Services homophobic

Chelse McKee, staff

The University of Manitoba Students’ Union (UMSU) holds open council meetings every second Thursday at 6 p.m. in 176 Helen Glass. The most recent meeting was held on Feb. 28, 2008.

With wavering quorum, the usual business was reported on by executive but the issue of Canadian Blood Services and inclusive language, brought up at the last council meeting, was finally passed by council.

The meeting began almost a half hour late due to a lack of quorum. While councillors waited for straggling members to arrive, they listened to a presentation by the 2008 curling brier.

Once the meeting was called, breaking out of the traditional pattern, Rachel Heinrichs, vice-president (student advocacy), who is usually last to report, began the meeting with her report. She mentioned that the Welcoming and Supportive Environment Taskforce (WaSE) met to discuss the implementation of suggestions in the 2006 WaSE report.

The WaSE report was developed based on the results of numerous focus groups of deans, the university’s administrative council and surveys of students. Questions were based on the university, determining strengths, weaknesses and the individual’s personal experience in campus life.

UMSU president Garry Sran discussed the recent revelations in the announcement of the 2008 federal budget. He spoke about the elimination of the Millennium Scholarship and the inclusion of numerous other scholarships, saying that the scholarships were great but that they were income-based rather than needs-based, which is what UMSU has been fighting for.

Amanda Johnson, vice-president (external), spoke about the First Aid for Student Aid program, a project for all Manitoban union members of the CFS, the U of M, the University of Winnipeg, Brandon University, and the Collège universitaire de Saint-Boniface, which was presented to the provincial government.

She reviewed the five points that were included in the report: students being able to borrow money under the current student aid system but being unable to earn more money, lowered borrowing interest rates, making the application process simpler, indexing the ACCESS program, and the creation of a $250-million capital fund to be used for items such as contributing to university budgets and the elimination of international student fees.

“Hand over funding to universities and colleges with strings attached only if institutions do not increase tuition and ancillary fees,” Johnson’s report stated.

During the executive report, Sran said that approval for web kiosks has been approved and that UMSU has already met with U of M’s Information Services and Technology (IST). The kiosks will be placed around the campus and students can use them to check the Aurora system, access e-mail, the UMSU and the university’s website, and check the Winnipeg Transit website, along with other sources.

UMSU will be sharing the costs of the kiosks with the university evenly. The implementation of the kiosks was not announced as locations still have to be discussed with IST.

The two motions, inclusive language and the Canadian Blood Services, which were long debated for over an hour at the last council meeting, were brought to council again after being revised by the policy and bylaw committee.

The inclusive language policy regards the issue of gender identification, so that UMSU forms, where gender is required, will allow people to self-identify.

Einarson, a member of the committee, presented the difference and suggestions put forth to the other members of council as well as the purpose of the amendment to the existing policies.

Einarson began with the inclusive language policy, saying that other universities, like McMaster and the University of Alberta, already have adopted a similar policy. Einarson addressed past concerns about the physiological issue of gender association, explaining that there are two approaches to the issue of gender identification on a form: medical (which does require biological gender association) and counselling (which is more open to gender identification). He said that the UMSU policy do the latter.

After a short debate period, the motion was passed.

The next issue regarded the relationship between UMSU and Canadian Blood Services (CBS) and questions conducted during the blood donor application process.

The specific questions being discussed were whether a man had engaged in sex with another man, even once, since 1977, and whether a woman had engaged in sex with a man who had done the aforementioned. An affirmative answer would leave the applicant permanently unable to donate.

If the CBS motion were passed, it would ultimately declare that UMSU believes that the “questionnaire used by [CBS] is known to be homophobic and discriminatory.”

Einarson explained that the motion, which was sent back to the committee last meeting, had since been clarified. The line that “UMSU acknowledges that the work of [CBS] is vital to the Canadian Health Care system and to the health of all Canadians” was also included in the motion.

During the debate period, Sran told the council that other schools across Canada have implemented a similar policy and that CBS plans to go across Canada to visit students’ unions and lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) campus groups. He added that, currently, CBS has a meeting with the University of Winnipeg Students’ Association later in March and that a date is still being discussed with UMSU.

Kaif Pardhan, representative for the Faculty of Medicine, said that the removals of specific questions, the ones potentially homophobic, are “not the best course in terms of health,” according to his research.

He said that a deferral period, a period of abstinence, of one to five years would be a better solution.

“Yes, the question is unfortunate . . . but it needs to stay for now.”

Sran said that it is not the removal of the question that is the issue but the issue of the behaviour as being risky.

Pardhan said that the Manitoba Medical Students Assocition, of which he is a representative, would “not [be] willing to support the motion.”

Matt Soprovich, a representative for the Faculty of Arts, said that the motion made the council sound “arrogant.”

“What this infers to me . . . supporting this seems to say that we can make better health policies.”

Draper said that it’s not the policy but just the language of the policy.

Finally, the issue was brought to a vote.

The motion was passed 10-3 in favour of the motion with two abstaining.