Temporary foreign workers sue lobster processor for pain, suffering and lost wages
CBC
Two temporary foreign workers are suing a northeast New Brunswick lobster plant for lost wages, wrongful termination and emotional pain and suffering.
Juan Pablo Lerma Lopez and Adriana de Leon Silva say that LeBreton Fisheries Inc. owes them about $7,000 each in contracted wages and are seeking $12,000 in damages after the company ended their contract early in 2023.
LeBreton Fisheries in Grand-Anse, on the Acadian Peninsula, was previously fined $365,000 and banned from hiring temporary foreign workers for two years after an investigation by Immigration and Citizenship Canada.
The details of the investigations have not been made public, including what led to the fine and what year the offences took place. The fine is the highest in Canada, according to the federal non-compliance database.
On Tuesday, Juan Pablo Lerma Lopez appeared at a news conference organized by Migrant Workers Alliance for Change, a national advocacy group.
"We have enough of abuses and we will not be silent anymore," said Lopez, whose Spanish was interpreted by Niger Saravia, an organizer with Migrant Workers Alliance for Change.
Lopez said he was promised steady work for six months at the lobster-processing plant but did not get that. He said he was left without income, food or any way to support his family back home in Mexico.
"I trusted the word of the company that brought me in," Lopez said.
"And I believed that these types of abuses that I was experiencing did not happen in the First World countries. But that was not the case."
Lopez remained in Canada after being dismissed from LeBreton, while Adriana de Leon Silva went back to Mexico.
Last month, the United Nations' special rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery released a scathing report on Canada's temporary foreign worker program.
The report outlines issues of wage theft, excessive work hours, limited breaks and physical abuse within the system. Special rapporteur Tomoya Obokata said he received reports of workers being underpaid and going without protective equipment, and of employers confiscating documents, arbitrarily cutting working hours and preventing workers from seeking health care.
According to the statement of claim against LeBreton, shared with CBC News by Migrant Workers Alliance for Change, the two employees landed in New Brunswick in April 2023 to work as general labourers in the processing plant.
The lawsuit says their contract stipulated they would have "an average" of 30 hours of work per week, over the course of six months.
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