Health care referendum to rerun in 2015

During the recent MSU Presidential Elections for the 2014-15 academic year, a health care referendum was put forward regarding expanding McMaster health plan coverage.

There were three different questions set forth in the referendum, asking students to take a yes or no stance on extended coverage to include eye doctor visits, prescription contraception, and other services like psychology and vaccines.

None of these three referenda passed. A McMaster student named Katrina Pullia approached the elections committee to appeal the referendum on the basis that there was not enough information provided to the student body.

The elections committee then made an appeal to the SRA to recommend that the referenda be rerun the following year, which was accepted by the SRA. The subject was brought forward at the SRA meeting on Sunday, March 23.

Regarding the appeal that was brought forward, Ryan Sparrow, SRA Social Science, stated that the main issue was a lack of information around the referendum.

“Information on the ballot confused a lot of people,” said Sparrow.

Some SRA members argued that this confusion made it difficult for voters to take a firm side on the issue. There were clarity issues regarding the language used, such as a misunderstanding of what prescription contraceptives entail. As well, the breakdown of the extended health plan was never publicized.

These concerns were brought to the attention of the SRA and they agreed that it makes sense to run another referendum during the 2015 MSU Presidential elections. MSU president David Campbell stated that the most important thing for the future is to publicize the issue more effectively so that students can publicly take a yes or no stance.

At the meeting, Chris Harper, SRA Health Science, pointed out the challenges that the SRA faced as an organization went beyond the motion, and feels that in general, the way that referendums are administered need improvement and more discussion.

Vice President (Finance) Jeffrey Doucet stated that one of the difficulties with the referendum is that there were a lot of questions and they were all asking drastically different things.

“My advice to next year’s SRA is to look at what services need to be enhanced and look at it one issue at a time,” stated Doucet.

Doucet suggested changes such as increasing the health plan incrementally as opposed to attempting to increase coverage by almost double, feeling that this could be a more effective way to communicate to students and grow the plan.

Anna D’Angela, Vice President (Administration), suggested that the individual caucuses of the SRA should each brainstorm how they will promote the information next year so that students can be aware and ask questions if needed.

Daniel D’Angela, SRA Social Science, stated the importance of next year’s SRA to bring forth the issue at the beginning of the school year, as opposed to into second term. This resulted in a motion passing recommending that the SRA have a decision in place by Nov. 1 2014, which passed unanimously.

This referendum was recommended by the SRA last year, and continued to be unsuccessful this year. The recommendation will again pass the responsibility along to the 2014/15 SRA in the hopes of fixing the issues that caused the referenda failure this year.

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