Migrant workers launch campaign and class action lawsuit

The Immigrant Workers Centre (IWC) and a group of migrant workers will discuss the situation that
gave rise to a class action lawsuit that was filed this morning. The IWC and the workers are
suing a placement agency operating under the name Trésor and its client company Newrest, a
multinational that provides catering services to major airlines at the Pierre Elliott Trudeau
Airport. This lawsuit has been filed by the law firm Trudel Johnston & Lespérance on behalf of
hundreds of workers seeking damages for the violation of their human rights.
“According to the stories many workers told us, Newrest and Trésor have deprived hundreds of
migrant workers of their basic human rights”, says Benoît Scowen of the IWC, the organization
acting as the representative of the workers before the Superior Court. “If you have flown out of
Pierre Elliott Trudeau Airport in the past two years, your airplane food may have been prepared
by a migrant worker experiencing serious abuse.”
The class action alleges that the defendants have exploited a 2020 change in federal
immigration policy which allows people already in Canada with visitor visas to apply for a work
permit through the Temporary Foreign Worker Program. Beginning in 2021 or 2022, Trésor
incited people to come to Canada on visitor visas and encouraged those who are already in
Canada to stay with the promise of stable work. Representatives of both Trésor and Newrest led
these workers to believe that they were legally allowed to work under a visitor visa during a
“probation period” or while their application for a proper work permit was being processed. In
reality, most workers never received valid permits at all.
“After seeing an ad on Facebook, I called Trésor and was told I had to fly to Montreal on a
visitor’s visa,” explained Helena (not her real name), a 39 year old woman from Mexico who
cares for five children and her elderly mother. “Trésor promised me that once I arrived, they
would quickly secure my contract and work permit at a major company. They sent me to
Newrest and told me to start working immediately. I believed my permit was being processed
and that I was able to work. Gradually, I realized that there was no permit coming — but both
Newrest managers and Trésor representatives pressured me to continue working under any
conditions they imposed with the threat of firing me and canceling my permit application. I was
manipulated into working for eight months without a permit and I was fired after trying to stand
up for my rights.”

The IWC is committed to assisting every worker who has been a victim of this scheme. There
are mechanisms to regularize their immigration situation and pathways to ensure that vulnerable
workers can receive protection if they come forward. In light of this scandal, the IWC is also
renewing its calls for the federal government to abolish the closed work permit system and
follow through on the program to regularize the hundreds of thousands of people in Canada
living without immigration status.

The IWC has made the office of the Minister of Immigration and Immigration, Refugees and
Citizenship Canada aware of the situation described in the class action. The Commission des
normes, de l'équité, de la santé et de la sécurité au travail has also been alerted to the alleged labour code violations and has been called to do investigations into both Trésor and Newrest.