Immigrants without work permits were paid $10 an hour to clean hospitals or serve food in CHSLDs. A situation admitted by the placement agency Groupe AMS, which has supplied workers to at least four CIUSSS.
She describes these people paid below the minimum wage as “volunteers” on the pretext that they do not have a work permit. Yet their occupation has all the attributes of a job. Two employees testify to Duty having been a full-time part of the hygiene and sanitation team sent for 9 to 10 months to different establishments of the CIUSSS du Nord-de-l’Île-de-Montréal, notably to the Hôpital du Sacré-Coeur-de -Montreal.
At least three other CIUSSS also did business directly with this company, of which Solange Crevier was designated as “the boss” by four employees. Mme Crevier has been convicted in the past for serial fraud, notably with Via Rail, Desjardins and the Ministry of Culture, and is currently serving an 18-month prison sentence.
The Center for Government Acquisitions (CAG), which handles group purchasing for the government, has just put this placement agency back on its list of those that can provide independent health workers.
Lured by the promise that a work permit application would be submitted in their name, the two newcomers who spoke out were paid well below the minimum wage, an illegal practice. They told their story on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals. Non-compliance with the minimum wage is a serious offense, the Commission for Standards, Equity, Health and Safety at Work (CNESST) has generally indicated.
“I was told that while waiting [le permis de travail], we can always work as a volunteer,” says Jean Pierre, under an assumed name. No action had been taken on his behalf with Immigration, Refugees, and Citizenship Canada (IRCC), it was noted.
Marc Turcotte, the man who appears as the largest shareholder of Groupe AMS in the official records and spouse of Solange Crevier, has no trouble admitting in an interview that the company does indeed pay employees $10 an hour.
But it was only while waiting for the immigration procedures to be completed, he defends himself: “We have no choice, we don’t know if the work permit will be accepted,” he justifies. . He blames the lack of work permits on administrative delays, but the applications have not even been submitted, IRCC confirmed to Duty.
Thousands of dollars owed
It ensures that a form of “retroactive” payment takes place when people receive their work permit. “If today you work at $10 an hour, you work 1000 hours in total. We pay you the difference, once you receive the work permit, so $12,000, less deductions,” he gives as an example.
“It’s clear that it’s to be able to hold us together: if you leave, you lose everything,” interprets Jean Pierre. “It’s a type of slavery,” in the eyes of his former colleague, Youri, who claims to have worked in around fifteen different places, all establishments of the CIUSSS du Nord-de-l’Île-de-Montréal.
The CIUSSS du Nord-de-l’Île-de-Montréal confirms having had a business relationship with Groupe AMS, but has “completely stopped using” its services since February 12, we assure. “Last February, we carried out an exhaustive check of the validity of the work permits of the resources employed by all of our service providers,” a public relations officer wrote to us after refusing our interview requests. Groupe AMS would then not have responded to these verification requests.
“The verification of work permits as well as the remuneration of hired resources” were also included in the agency’s contractual obligations, we write.
When asked if he is aware that it is illegal to withhold amounts bringing the salary below the minimum, Mr. Turcotte responds in an interview: “No, according to whom? »
“I am a prisoner of the agency, I am mixed up to the neck,” said Jean Pierre. The duty calculated that the Groupe AMS agency deducted a minimum of $15,000 from his expected salary.
Without hours worked for almost three months, his bank balance shows $152 when he opens his banking application to show us proof of the agency’s transfers. She recently refused to assign him to another job and to provide him with his immigration file. “I’m just told that it’s quiet these days,” he says discouraged.
Youri claims to have tried to get his money back after noticing that no step had been taken in immigration after 10 months. “I went to see them and asked for access to my file. They threatened me, saying: I’m going to have you reported, I’m going to have you excluded from the country,” he alleges.
“It’s not plausible. I deny that there were threats of deportations,” replies Mr. Turcotte.
He also admits that the employees “have nothing to prove” the amounts remaining to be paid, neither statement nor written contract on the “retroactive”. “It’s not complicated, we do it in the number of hours,” he repeats.
And what happens if the permit is refused? “It only happened once and the person returned to their country,” he says, refusing to specify whether any sums owed to him had been reimbursed.
Fake volunteers
The stratagem is rather simple: “I first signed an official employment contract,” explains Youri to begin with, as does Jean Pierre.
They were then promised $22.50 per hour for cleaning tasks, as soon as they received a favorable response from the two immigration departments (provincial, then federal).
The same day as the official contract, Youri signs a “double contract” in front of the one he calls “the boss of the agency.” He will then spontaneously designate her as his “boss” in photos of Solange Crevier, just like Jean Pierre, who calls her “Madame Turcotte”. “It’s a volunteer contract which, according to their words, allows you to work for $10 an hour while waiting for the paperwork to be sorted out,” says Youri.
We can read on this contract that “compensation of $70” per volunteer shift is granted to reimburse transportation, telephone and meal costs.
However, immigrant employees clearly consider their functions as employment and transfers as remuneration. They receive shifts via text, messages that The duty was able to consult. The payments received do not correspond to the planned fixed compensation: for 62 hours of work, a bank transfer of $620 to the label “9200-4050” is made, i.e. the agency’s business number , for 73 hours, a transfer of $730, for 55 hours, a transfer of $550.
Do the people who signed the volunteer contract perform the same tasks as an employee? “In my opinion, yes, [les mêmes] than a hospital employee,” Marc Turcotte responds bluntly.
“I don’t see how it can be legal,” analyzes Dalia Gesualdi-Fecteau, professor at the School of Industrial Relations at the University of Montreal and specialist in employment agencies. “A volunteer is someone who carries out tasks on an ad hoc basis, but in any case without replacing an employee and who does not have an employment contract,” she explains.
She sees in the description given by the two men all the attributes of a job: the performance (tasks which correspond to a job), the subordination to the authority of an employer and the payment of a salary in return.
We cannot therefore “on the one hand say that a person has an employment contract” and on the other, “qualify him as a volunteer”: “The only objective in this case would be to avoid the application of the law,” she says.
An employer can withhold certain amounts from salary “with a written document for specific purposes”, continues this expert, “but never below the minimum wage, that is very clear”.
“Excessive” cost of the work permit
At the time of signing the employment contract, Youri and Jean Pierre claim to have paid $4,500 to the agency and have to pay another $2,000 later to obtain the work permit.
These immigration procedures would therefore ultimately cost them $6,500, depending on what they report, an “exaggerated” amount, according to immigration lawyer Krishna Gagné. It is prohibited to charge recruitment fees to workers, as well as several components of the procedures. Only about half of the work permit preparation fees [au fédéral] and the worker component of the Quebec Acceptance Certificate” can be billed to the worker, explains Me Won.
An invoice of $6,500 for the worker for consultant or immigration lawyer fees would therefore be “very hard to justify,” she says. And it would still be necessary to “really detail this invoice”, maintains Me Won.
Neither Mr. Turcotte nor his lawyer David Beaudoin confirmed this cost, affirming that “it is the administration which takes care of it”.
An agency with a changing identity
Before being in prison, Solange Crevier presented herself as the head of Groupe AMS, but she is ghostly on the papers.
The agency is instead registered with the authorities under the name of her spouse, Marc Turcotte. “I’m the boss,” he assures.
He refuses to say if she is a manager or if she would act as a nominee, while admitting that his wife is “an employee”. Later in the interview, he will specify that Mme Crevier “is still there”, that is to say in the agency’s offices.
During the first visit of the Duty, two employees designated “Solange” or “Madame Turcotte” as the person to whom they report. A woman with the first name Hiba who says she is the director of human resources, calls her “her boss” a few times.
In a request last March to the Court of Appeal, Solange Crevier also affirmed “having to ensure the activities of the company which [son conjoint] is the owner.