An international aviation catering company and a Quebec recruitment firm allegedly lured foreign workers to Canada under false pretences and exploited them, according to a proposed class-action lawsuit.
The Immigrant Workers Centre in Montreal is seeking authorization to launch the suit against Laval, Que.-based placement firm Tr茅sor and inflight catering company Newrest, along with several affiliated companies.
The workers centre is acting on behalf of more than 400 people since 2021 who it says were falsely promised they would be given work permits and legitimate jobs in Canada by Tr茅sor 鈥� but were instead encouraged to work illegally.
鈥淭he defendants treated the members of the class like objects: controllable, disposable, replaceable and exploitable. These experiences were profoundly degrading and dehumanizing for the members of the class and undermined their dignity, their psychological security and their self-esteem,鈥� says the request for authorization filed by lawyers with Montreal law firm Trudel Johnston & Lesp茅rance.
鈥淚n particular, the express or implicit threats of deportation and criminalization wielded by the defendants terrorized the members of the class. Their irregular status 鈥� a situation orchestrated by the defendants despite the efforts of members to obtain legal permits 鈥� remains a profound source of stress and anxiety,鈥� the application says.
Lawyers for the plaintiffs allege that Tr茅sor recruited workers from Spanish-speaking countries, encouraging some to come to Canada as visitors. Others were already in Canada on visitor visas, the lawyers say.
鈥淭he members of the group were fraudulently encouraged to work during a 鈥榩robationary period,鈥� a period during which the members had, in fact, no valid work permit. Tr茅sor assured the group members that it was completely normal for them to start working in the meantime because the regulatory process for obtaining a permit had begun,鈥� the proposed lawsuit says.
But few of the workers would ever be given permits, the lawsuit alleges.
Beno卯t Scowen, with the Immigrant Workers Centre, said a small number of the plaintiffs received permits after working for the companies for several months. Others, he said, worked for nearly a year without ever receiving a permit.
鈥淲hat workers understood was that in order to obtain this work permit, they had to keep working on their visitor status and that they did not have the option to stop working and wait for their work permit to arrive,鈥� he said in a phone interview, adding that many believed that if they were fired, they would be deported.
Most of the workers recruited by Tr茅sor were placed at Newrest production facilities, where they prepared meals for flights leaving from the Montreal-Trudeau International Airport. The proposed suit alleges that Newrest was fully aware the workers did not have permits and that the vast majority would never get them.
鈥淭he defendants jointly took advantage of the vulnerability of the members of the class and the legal precarity that they created to enrich themselves. All the members of the class were defrauded, had their fundamental rights violated and suffered serious prejudice,鈥� the application reads.
The workers, who were paid by Tr茅sor, often received less than minimum wage, were not properly paid overtime hours and were not given workplace and health insurance, the suit says.
The suit also alleges that workers were not properly trained or equipped for the physical work they were required to do and that they were forced to labour in unclean and dangerous conditions.
Guillermo Montiel, the president of Tr茅sor, said he hasn鈥檛 seen the court filing but is 鈥渟tunned鈥� by the allegations.
鈥淲e鈥檙e an agency that has operated completely legally since 2013. We have never offered a job to someone who doesn鈥檛 have permits,鈥� said Montiel, who is named in the suit.
Newrest did not respond to a request for comment on Tuesday.
The lawsuit, which has not yet been approved by a judge 鈥� a required step for all class actions 鈥� is seeking unspecified damages from the companies.
Scowen said his organization鈥檚 legal clinic has been helping a growing number of workers who are facing similar situations since the federal government began in 2020 to allow people on visitor visas to transition to work permits without having to leave the country.
Foreign workers on closed work permits 鈥� which are tied to a single employer 鈥� can apply for a one-year open permit if they suffer abuse. But people who don鈥檛 have permits at all have little recourse when their employers mistreat them, Scowen said.
鈥淭his practice basically creates a new class of migrant workers who don鈥檛 have easy access to that existing protection mechanism, and this makes it a lot easier for employers to demand more of them, to further exploit them, to underpay them, to abuse them psychologically or physically,鈥� he said.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 3, 2023.
Jacob Serebrin, The Canadian Press
