Labour Day rally to protest treatment of migrant workers, actions of CBSA in raid at Hastings Racecourse

VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) — The poor treatment of migrant workers is the focus of a Labour Day rally outside the main entrance to the PNE.

One of the organizers, Magin Payet, says last month’s immigration raid at Hastings Racecourse led to at least seven people–mainly from Mexico–being asked to leave Canada.

On Aug. 19th as many as 26 contract workers were rounded up at the track. Many were taken away in handcuffs.

“There’s also a concern about the overwhelmingly militarized response. [Canad Border Services Agency] detained everybody that they deemed to be potentially here unlawfully, meaning anyone that spoke Spanish or wasn’t a white person,” she says.

Payet says with scrutiny on the plight of migrants being detained in the US, it’s important not to give Canada a pass.

“I think it’s important to remember that this does happen in Canada. Canada has it’s own history of criminalizing people who are coming here for work, and to live as well,” Payet says

Last week, BC Attorney General David Eby confirmed the focus of the CBSA investigation is a gaming branch employee accused of falsifying documents and possibly misleading migrant employees into believing they had  the documents they needed to work in Canada.

Payet says the provincial government should have considered how involving CBSA would affect the workers

“That he would just kind of pass the buck onto CBSA instead of taking a more of a careful approach to make sure that those workers weren’t going to be negatively impacted,” Payet says. “They actually didn’t do anything wrong.”

 

Top Stories

Top Stories

Most Watched Today