Noe Arteaga was working hard in the fields of Quebec,
But his plans to go back to school or build a house with his savings, after a season of honest work in the fields and greenhouses of Quebec, came tumbling down when one of his co-workers got sick.
Another farmhand working for Savoura at its high-tech facility in St. Étienne des Grès wasn't adapting so well to the life of a modern migrant worker.
A combination of long hours working with pesticides, taking too many energy drinks to keep up the pace, and a severe case of homesickness as he shared an apartment with five other men, hit Osvaldo Otoniel hard.
"He went crazy," Arteaga said. "The first day he was still working, but people started to be afraid of him. Some thought he was possessed by the devil." Rather than send Otoniel to the hospital, however, the company locked him on a school bus, Arteaga said.
When the other workers needed the bus to go out to the fields, Otoniel was transferred to the lunchroom. And so it went, back and forth, for several days.
Arteaga sent an email to the Guatemalan consulate. Nothing happened. Then he helped organize a work-stoppage.
"We said we wouldn't go back to work until Osvaldo was taken to the hospital." The impromptu strike lasted only a few hours, but it worked. Otoniel was taken to hospital.
But when he was released, both he and Arteaga were told they were being sent back to Guatemala. Within hours they were on a plane.
"They said I was a bad worker and I was gone. That was it. Anyway, I had nowhere to live. Your employer is also your landlord." Every summer, more and more foreign workers are transplanted into Quebec's deserted farms - from 860 in 1995 to 6,627 in 2008 - saving an industry from collapse and putting food on Quebec tables.
By most accounts, it's a win-win arrangement. The farms get reliable, minimum-wage labour to plant and harvest the crops.
The workers, at least on paper, have the same rights as Quebecers, including free medicare. They even pay employment insurance, though they don't claim benefits because they are sent home when their contract is over.
The workers, meanwhile, go home as kings, having made more money in three months than they would make in a year in their own countries. (Contracts usually run from three to eight months.) It's no wonder 90 per cent choose to return to the same farm the next year.
But cases like Arteaga's are raising questions about whether the program leaves workers vulnerable to abuse, because their employer is also their landlord and deportation agent, and because they need the money - at whatever cost.
Arteaga had another four months on his contract when he was repatriated.
"They are 100 per cent disposable," says Michael Freeman, of the Immigrant Workers' Centre in Côte des Neiges. "If they are good, they can come back for 10 years, but if the employer doesn't like them, they can get rid of them and they will never be back in North America again. ... There is no third-party oversight." With his work visa still valid six weeks after his repatriation, Arteaga got back on a plane to Montreal, and has taken his case to the Commission des relations du travail.
His complaint, against the in-house union, the Syndicat des employés de Savoura, for not defending him, and against the company for wrongful dismissal, will be heard Aug. 24.
"The message to the other workers was clear: Shut up and pick, or go home and live in poverty like Noé," Arteaga says.
It's not clear how many are sent home early. Out of sight and out of mind.
René Mantha, the president of FERME - Fondation des entreprises en recrutement de main-d'oeuvre étrangère - which represents about 450 farm owners in Quebec, and also runs a travel agency to bring workers to and fro, says only five to 10 workers were repatriated last year before the end of their contracts.
Some can't handle the work, he says. A Mexican who arrived recently is obese and can't be on his feet all day. Some are bad alcoholics, and others can't work in groups. There have even been knife fights between workers.
"Do you wait until there's a murder on your farm?" Mantha asks. "The (foreign workers) don't go home after work. They stay together all day and all night. I can tell you some of them sleep with one eye open." In Arteaga's case, Mantha recommended to Savoura that it refund him for his plane ticket and give him severance pay.
As for the motives of his dismissal, Mantha said that's up to the commission to determine.
Savoura did not return repeated phone calls by The Gazette.
Mantha also admitted there may be bad employers out there, as there are everywhere. Some farms have been excluded from the program because of the way they treated their workers, he said.
But workers can seek redress with their consulates - which have to sign off on any request for repatriation - and are routinely asked for their comments back home.
The idea of having a third party to review conditions on farms, however, would be akin to "using an elephant to crush a mouse." Who would pay for it? he asked.
Andrea Galvez, the co-ordinator of the Agricultural Workers Alliance support centre in St. Rémi, says there are many forced repatriations - they're just not classified as such.
When workers get sick or have an accident, they are sometimes told to go home if they can't work, and they do, not knowing they are entitled to compensation and care right here. It is then considered a "voluntary leave." The same goes for stress-related illnesses or breakdowns, a common occurrence, she said. One worker committed suicide two years ago.
Then there are those who speak out for better working conditions.
Bonifacio Santos Moreno was one of three people repatriated to Mexico in 2006 because they signed union cards.
He took his case to the commission and won - he was reinstated in his job at La Legumiere Y.C., where he had worked for six years.
But last year, while working for a different company, Santos Moreno returned to the commission to testify about conditions on farms and was promptly fired and repatriated again.
According to the company, it was Santos Moreno who found the job "too demanding and wanted to go home." Noé Arteaga just received his record of employment from Savoura on Wednesday. The reason for the record? "He returned to his country."
Source : The Montreal Gazette
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