Migrant workers win lawsuit against New Brunswick seafood processor over unpaid wages

Two migrant workers who came to Canada through the Temporary Foreign Worker program have won a lawsuit against a prominent New Brunswick seafood processing company over unpaid wages – a rare outcome for a category of workers that is often vulnerable to employer exploitation.

In late August, LeBreton & Sons Fisheries Ltd. agreed to pay two of its former employees from Mexico a total of $11,000 in lost wages, as part of a settlement for a 2024 lawsuit filed by the workers in a New Brunswick small claims court. Last week, the workers, Juan Pablo Lerma Lopez and Adriana de Leon Silva, received their cheques from LeBreton, closing the chapter of a years-long legal battle against the lobster company.

Suing an employer is one of the few avenues for workers to receive compensation for mistreatment. Workers can file complaints with provincial labour ministries if they suspect their employers are violating rules, but that process is often lengthy and does not guarantee monetary compensation for an employee. At the federal level, Employment and Social Development Canada, the ministry in charge of the TFW program, will fine employers who violate the program’s rules – but again, there is no direct mechanism for workers to get compensation for employer mistreatment.

“We hope this victory will make the employer change the way they treat employees,” Mr. Lopez said in an interview from his home in Nayarit, Mexico. “Life in Mexico is hard, I do not have a steady job. But it is better than the experience with LeBreton, which was traumatic for me,” he added.

LeBreton did not respond to a request for comment on the settlement of the lawsuit.

From the archives: Migrant New Brunswick workers sue seafood processor, claiming exploitation

Ottawa’s low-wage Temporary Foreign Worker program is a popular immigration stream for employers looking to hire foreign workers in a jurisdiction or industry where there is a local labour shortage. But the program has been fraught with controversy for years, with allegations of exploitation by employers surfacing across multiple industries, including in restaurants, retail and farms. Much of this is linked to the program’s closed work-permit design, which ties a foreign worker to one employer, making it impossible for them to switch employers, even in situations where they might be facing mistreatment.

LeBreton has a history of run-ins with the federal government over its treatment of foreign workers. In March this year, ESDC fined LeBreton $90,000 for not following program rules – specifically, for not ensuring that its workplace was “free of abuse,” according to the ministry’s portal of non-compliant employers.

In 2024, the seafood company was fined $365,750 and banned from the TFW program for two years because of infractions around salaries, record-keeping and failure to provide a violence-free workplace. But that penalty was appealed by the company, and partially overturned by a federal court in January on the basis that the government’s decision lacked procedural fairness.

Critically, LeBreton was allowed by the court to continue using the TFW program.

Migrant-rights advocates argue that the ministry’s compliance regime has no process to directly compensate workers for mistreatment, even as the government collects hefty fines from companies found breaking the law. “In the case of Juan Pablo and Adriana, their only recourse to gain back wages owed to them was to file a lawsuit against a large company,” said Karen Cocq, co-executive director of the Migrant Workers Alliance for Change.

Mr. Lopez had alleged in the 2024 lawsuit that LeBreton breached his employment contract by not giving him adequate working hours and not employing him for the full six months stated in the terms. He came to Canada in April, 2023, through the TFW program, along with 50 other migrant workers from Mexico and the Philippines, to work at LeBreton’s lobster processing plant in Grande-Anse, N.B. Mr. Lopez was supposed to work an average of 30 hours a week, at $16.50 an hour.

From the archives: Conditions for migrant workers in New Brunswick seafood industry abusive, dangerous: report

But, according to the lawsuit, he was not assigned any hours of work for his first month in Canada. He said in subsequent weeks, his work hours rarely met the 30 hours promised in the contract, and he struggled to feed himself. LeBreton did not respond specifically to a question about why they gave employees limited hours of work.

That July, according to the lawsuit, Mr. Lopez and other foreign workers at the plant approached the Migrant Workers Alliance for Change in New Brunswick to ask about how to file a complaint against LeBreton. A month later, they were terminated by the employer – a move that they believe was linked to their meeting with the migrant rights group. At the time, in the notice of termination to Ms. Silva and Mr. Lopez, a LeBreton company director said they were fired because of a shortage of available work.

Through the lawsuit, Mr. Lopez obtained a settlement of $6,000 from LeBreton, a number that came close to what he alleged he lost out on wages. His former colleague, Ms. Silva, was awarded $5,000. She too, had alleged that LeBreton did not assign her adequate hours of work, and breached her employment contract.

Ms. Silva currently lives and works in Nayarit as well. She told The Globe in an interview from her home country that she is “happy” about the compensation, but concerned that LeBreton is allowed to keep hiring foreign workers who risk mistreatment. Ms. Silva said that despite her experience at LeBreton, she would still like to return to Canada to work for a different employer if the opportunity arose.

There have been other instances of foreign workers suing their employers over workplace violations, but they are relatively uncommon and workers often need assistance from an external organization, said Vasanthi Venkatesh, an associate professor of law at the University of Windsor.

Additionally, she noted, employers do not necessarily fulfill the conditions of a settlement.

In May, Polat Construction, an Ontario company, was ordered by the provincial labour board to pay two temporary foreign workers from Jamaica $178,000 in unpaid wages after they filed complaints to the board. But Polat never complied with the order and subsequently declared bankruptcy.

“There should be a government fund set up to compensate for wage theft,” Prof. Venkatesh said. “In the case of temporary foreign workers, this is the least they can do.”