Ten years of legal wrangling between the Canadian Federation of Students (CFS) and the student administrations of four major Canadian universities finally came to an end last weekend. CFS-S, the services body of the CFS, agreed to partially hand over ownership of Travel Cuts, its student travel agency, to student unions at universities across the country.

The CFS, along with the University Students’ Council of the University of Western Ontario, the University of Alberta Students’ Union, the Alma Mater Society of the University of British Columbia, and the Alma Mater Society of Queen’s University reached an out-of-court settlement that averted a protracted trial over the ownership of Travel Cuts, or Canadian Universities Travel Service Limited.

Travel Cuts suppies students with discount air and train tickets as well as the popular International Student Identity cards.

“We’re in favour of the settlement and we’re glad that all the parties have come together to settle this issue,” said Spencer Keys, president of the Alma Mater Society of UBC.

The new framework sees CFS-S retaining 76 per cent of Travel Cuts shares with the remaining 24 per cent to be owned by a non-profit corporation that is to be created as a result of the settlement, and which will include the four plaintiff student associations as well as other non-CFS schools.

Furthermore, the Travel Cuts board of directors is to be enlarged to eight members with the non-profit corporation appointing two of the eight.

Other matters tackled through the agreement inlcuded the creation of a Unanimous Shareholders Agreement, which provided a platform for the sharing of past and future revenues of Travel Cuts between the CFS and the student unions.

Keys emphasized that students of the other CFS schools, including U of T, will now be receiving an advantage because the company is more competitive under the new model.

“The schools in play can provide some significant benefits because of their size and by simply having more eyes on the books,” said Keys, who formally stepped down from his post yesterday. “It has pleased me immensely that the settlement of this lawsuit is my last major act of office.”

The student unions alleged that the service body of the Canadian Federation of Students illegally transferred assets, including Travel Cuts, from the now-defunct Association of Student Councils Canada to itself in 1987. Many of the same members were on the boards of both organizations.

“We still firmly believe it should have happened as it did,” said Philip Link, executive director of the CFS-S, who claims the transfer was sound except for a few technical matters.

The University of Western Ontario was the first student union to get involved in the lawsuit in 1996 and began looking for partners in 1998. UBC became involved in 1999 for primarily business reasons, according to Keys.

“There was a feeling that there was a wrong that had been committed and that UBC students were disadvantaged,” he said.

“Certainly, over ten years, groups can become used to their thinking and what happened here was that we all had a collective moment of clarity.”