RELATED STORY: Danny Williams addresses students at CFS national meeting

On Wednesday, the Canadian Federation of Students and the Office of the Premier of Newfoundland and Labrador sent out separate news releases announcing that Williams would be addressing the students attending the CFS conference. A first minister addressing the CFS is a news story and a few members of the national media, myself included, decided to cover the story.

When I arrived at the hall that the speech was occurring, I walked in and asked where the media pool was to set up. I was pointed to the back of the room. I started to make my way to the back of the room. A few delegates shook my hand and spoke to me. I continued to make my way to the back. Near the back were the delegates from the Student Society of McGill University. I was speaking with them, listening to what they thought of the meeting so far and asking them about their motion for media transparency. I was impressed by how focused they are at making the CFS better in order for them to join. One of their main concerns is accountability and transparency. They were just telling me about their concerns with how the CFS acts towards the media when Scott Payne, the Canadian Federation of Students chairperson in B.C., came up to me.

He told me that I was to leave immediately because I was not welcome. I pulled out my business card which clearly shows that I am a member of the national media and gave it to him.

He basically told me that he did not care about that and that I was to leave. I said to him that the Premier of Newfoundland's office had invited the media by sending a release. He said that yes the media was invited but that I was not the media, and that "Joey Coleman is not welcome here and we are asking Joey Coleman to leave."

At this point, I explained to him that by asking me to leave, they were asking a member of the media to leave and they would leave my no choice but to write that story.

He said that they were not asking Maclean's to leave, they were asking me to leave. He said that real reporters were welcome, and that I was not a reporter. (Ian Boyko gave me a similar line the other day over the phone. The CFS loves to say that I "do not work for Maclean's, I just write on their website." If someone can explain this to me, please do.)

At this point, the rest of the media pool was taking notes and a camera was focused on the situation. Rachel Gottiff of the CFS executive was brought over to assist in escorting me out. I made clear to them that I was required to file a story and that the story would be about them removing me.

Suddenly a CFS staffer stepped in, said to let me into the cage and I joined the rest of the media behind the crowd control barrack they had to keep the media as far away as possible from the event.

The CFS staffer had a talk to Payne who came apologizing, stating that it was a misunderstanding and that he was really sorry for any embarassment it may have caused.

Here is a picture of the media "cage":

(This photos were taken before most of the media arrived as I was moving into the cage)

A few members of the press pool inquired as to what stories I had covered that involved the CFS in the past. I told them about a few, including the Douglas College Student Union crisis. Global News extensively covered it and you will see in the second segment that I am not the only member of the mainstream media they do not like: http://www.dailymotion.com/student3. Nick Martin of the Winnipeg Free Press is also in the bad books of the CFS.

The CFS stationed a person at the cage to make sure that the media did not leave the small area inside of the cage to get a better shot of what was occurring. This resulted in many of us not being able to get good visuals of the speech or the crowd. It is too bad for the CFS, without those visuals, the story gets buried and in some cases shortened when reported. It because apparent to the media pool that the CFS did not want us there and the pool did not take kindly to being in a small caged in area. A few of us actually had to keep moving in and out of the front of the cage to take photos because there was not enough room for us to all take photos at once. The barriers were overkill. I have never been to an event or covered any story where journalists were boxed in like that.

You know CFS, you really need to stop treating the media with such distain. It is not helping your cause. I have two suggestions: how about you stop telling Maclean's who is and is not one of their reporters, and how about you let the media do our job and instead focus on doing your own!