The Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU) Board of Directors (BoD) debated restricting Post-Graduate Students’ Society (PGSS) members’ access to the SSMU food pantry, and approved new funding for Indigenous student aid during its meeting on Jan. 20.
The debate surrounding the food pantry stemmed from a motion approved at the most recent SSMU Legislative Council (LC) meeting, which proposed implementing a fee for PGSS members to access the service. SSMU Vice-President (VP) External Seraphina Crema-Black told the BoD that the motion’s final wording did not reflect the intent of the LC’s position.
“We discussed what this motion would look like during the Legislative Council [meeting],” Crema-Black said. “During this discussion, we spoke of stopping the disallowance of the food pantry after a discussion about the fee levy had happened between PGSS and SSMU representatives. The motion was still approved in its writing.”
Crema-Black moved to remove the food pantry provision from the motion, arguing that restricting access to the food pantry would disproportionately affect graduate students who rely on the service. In response, Alumni Representative Joshua Chin cautioned against overturning a decision approved by the Legislative Council without clear legal justification.
“Ultimately, I get the feeling that this motion is more or less a political decision that was approved by the Legislative Council,” Chin said. “I’d be uncomfortable disallowing based on purely political or convenience reasons, if really there’s no case to be made for legal or operational necessity.”
The board did not reach a definitive conclusion on restricting PGSS member access to the food pantry during the meeting.
The BoD also reviewed a report from SSMU Elections on the Fall 2025 referendum and Plebiscite questions. Chief Officer of SSMU Elections Mike Lee addressed voter turnout, noting that low participation was not due to a lack of awareness.
“So the analysis here is that SSMU members do vote,” Lee said. “When I first started, we really questioned whether people don’t vote because they simply didn’t know if they had to vote or not. This clearly shows that they do get their Simply Voting emails. They do know they can vote. It does depend on what they think is relevant.”
The board later approved a motion allocating $180,000 CAD in four installments over four years to fund Indigenous student aid and scholarships. VP University Affairs Susan Aloudat emphasized the motion’s goal of increasing accessibility for Indigenous students seeking to study at McGill, stating that SSMU wants the application process for scholarships to be non-invasive.
“Our mandate is to support and empower our Indigenous students,” Aloudat said. “We want to encourage Indigenous student enrollment. The idea is that McGill was supposed to increase how many Indigenous students we had, but we actually found that it’s decreasing. So the purpose of this award is to decrease the barriers to entry to education at McGill as much as possible for Indigenous students.”
The board also ratified a revised 2025–26 budget previously approved by the Legislative Council, suspending the Internal Regulations of Finance, and appointed Director Simon Ngassam to the Accountability Committee. The meeting concluded with a confidential session.
Moment of the Meeting
The board approved an advance loan of $60,000 CAD for MustBus, a student-run SSMU service group which provides transportation for students.
Soundbite
“I think that it’s very, very bad for the SSMU’s reputation if we go ahead with [pulling PGSS access to the food pantry] [….] We’ve been speaking with them about a fee levy and introducing a fee for the food pantry. I want to know whether that’s something that they would consider before we pull access, especially because it’s used disproportionately by PGSS members, and food insecurity is a very important issue.” — VP External Seraphina Crema Black on the motion to restrict PGSS access to the SSMU food pantry.
