Protesting too much, or too little

I tried and tried to make a table with information about complaints, but I'm relegated to making a brief summary. As summaries, these don't reflect the whole story, which you can seek out at the CRO's complaints page.

Complaints are an important, but unfortunate, part of any campaign. Drawing up complaints takes time, energy and specialized knowledge. If you don't have any volunteers with knowledge of the various by-laws, you probably won't bother with many complaints. Making them too regularly about insignificant issues will draw the CRO's ire. And in at least a few cases, slates have been outright disqualified from the elections (only to be reinstated - see below.)

The CRO's rulings on complaints can be appealed to the EDIE Board. Back in the glory days, the Board was chaired by a retired justice (and the CRO was a former election observer, not just student UMSU staff) and the other seats were held by students. Many an EDIE Board session have gone late into the night, including two that reversed disqualifications on the eve of the voting period. Riveting.

This year, there have been six complaints. First, three complains about pre-campaigning:

1. 20 Feb: Students United complained that Clean Slate had made some moves on Facebook that could be construed as campaigning through Facebook; the CRO issued a warning.


2. 24 Feb: Students United reported that Pierce Cairns (Regressive Conservatives) had announced his intention to run to his entire class during a Pharmacy lecture; the CRO declared that Cairns would be penalized by forcing him to wait 24 hours into the campaign period before he could begin his own campaign.


3. 26 Feb: The CRO found that Clean Slate had uploaded their website to a private server prior to the start of the campaign period; a warning was issued.

And three campaign-period complaints:

4. 28 Feb: Clean Slate's campaign manager complained about improper use of tables by Students United. The CRO sustained the complaint but noted that her (the CRO's) instructions on the topic were not clear; a warning was issued.


5. 29 Feb: Somebody, quite possibly affiliated with Students United but I can't confirm this, complained that Clean Slate's leaflets were not directly linked to an individual. (For those familiar with this peculiar rule, posters and other printed materials must be directly attributed to a candidate, not just a slate.) The CRO ruled that all such leaflets printed must be returned to her, and any not returned would be counted against Clean Slate's budgets.


6. 29 Feb: Clean Slate argued that Students United had erected a poster on their slate campaign office window, in violation of certain University provisions. The CRO dismissed the complaint, noting the relevant provisions did not apply to private office space.

What to infer from this?

• Individual candidates from Students United are listed as making complaints, but I have another bridge for anyone who thinks the candidates actually wrote them. They have about a thousand volunteers, many with deep UMSU experience.


• Clean Slate's campaign manager has also been busy with complaints. Her knowledge of University Centre regulations must have been either a fluke, or through very intensive research; and if it was the latter, it was not a good use of her time given the minuscule nature of the potential infraction - one poster in an office down a hallway that nobody walks through. Clean Slate also didn't bother making any pre-campaigning complaints, perhaps hoping they could run a "friendly" and complaint-free campaign. Oops!


• The Regressives haven't bothered with any complaints, probably because of their lack of volunteer infrastructure and lack of knowledge of the complicated regulations surrounding an election, which would also explain why they thought they could seek signatures via public announcement to a classroom.

Will there be more during the voting period? Probably, but we'll have to wait and find out!