A group of migrant farm workers in Quebec started on Tuesday their bid to join a union after asking the provincial labour board for approval.

The move, the first in a series of hearings this week, is being called a "historical breakthrough" for foreign agriculture workers in Canada.

About 100 migrant workers from three Quebec farms voted earlier in September to join the United Food and Commercial Workers Union (UFCW). Meanwhile, 60 workers from one Manitoba farm are waiting until January for that province's labour relations board to hear their case for joining the UFCW.

If the bids are approved by the provinces' respective labour relations boards, the workers will be able to enforce their contracts and benefits, and could bargain for better wages and working conditions.

It wasn't too hard to convince workers to sign their cards, said Louis Bolduc, executive assistant to the national director of le Syndicat des travailleurs et travailleuses unis de l’alimentation et du commerce (TUAC), the Quebec chapter of the UFCW.

"They found out the only way they could have a voice is to be in a union," he said.

Workers don't know their rights

About 20,000 workers from Mexico and the Caribbean are brought to Canada to work on farms each year, where they plant and harvest fruit and vegetable crops.

Their contracts are set up bilaterally by their home country's governments and Canadian officials, under the Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program.

The contracts offer basic agricultural wages and living standards along with minimal deductions and health care, but often workers aren't aware of it, said Roberto Nieto, who co-ordinates the Migrant Workers' Support Centre in Montreal.

"They don't even know they have the right to see a doctor, or that they have a medicare card, and that they're also covered by the CSST [Quebec's work and safety board], and that they're covered by private insurance for which they've paid," said Nieto.

In Manitoba, the main issues affecting migrant workers are living and working conditions, said UFCW Local 832 president Robert Ziegler. "When they're here, they live basically in employer-provided facilities, very crowded, and there are some concerns," Ziegler said on Friday.

Quebec migrant workers isolated

In Quebec, about 4,300 seasonal workers, mostly from Mexico, work across the province each year. Most of them end up in the outskirts of Montreal, on the south shore or in the Laurentians. They earn an average of $8.25 an hour and work 40 hour a week.

Many workers are illiterate and don't understand their contracts because "it's complicated legal language," said Nieto, who has run support programs for workers south of Montreal since 2003.

Workers are isolated because they live on rural farms, and don't speak the local language, circumstances that make it difficult for workers to stand up for their rights, he explained.

And while some farm owners respect and uphold migrant workers' rights, others will discourage workers from challenging the status quo, said Bolduc.

"It's a shame to see how some [employers] treat people.  Workers are covered by the minimum standard law, like Canadian workers."

During the union membership drive in the summer, several workers who expressed interest in joining were harassed by their bosses, Bolduc said. "They are intimidated. There are many threats [toward] immigrant workers, like, 'If you don't do this, if you don't do that, you're going to go back home. Tomorrow.'" 

But workers are confident the union membership will change that, he added.

The Quebec workers' bid to have their certification approved is being challenged by their employers. Owners claim migrant workers can't be part of a Canadian union because they aren't Canadian citizens.
 
'Doing the right thing': Manitoba union

In Manitoba, meanwhile, about 60 Mexican workers from Mayfair Farms near Portage la Prairie have expressed interest in forming a union. They voted Friday in a secret ballot; their votes may not be opened until January, when the Manitoba Labour Relations Board holds a hearing into the matter.
 
Similar to the situation in Quebec, the farm's owners have argued that the migrant workers do not have the right to unionize because they are not Canadian citizens.
 
"We believe in treating people fairly. We believe in doing the right thing," said Manitoba UFCW Local 832 president Robert Ziegler.
 
"They're doing the exact same job [as Canadian citizens]. We don't exploit people. We try and promote ourselves and Canada as a goal for other countries to copy our standards."
 
Ziegler said the Mexican workers, who are responsible for planting and picking vegetables, are the first migrant workers who have attempted to unionize in the province.