Deliverers in a hurry of generalized uberization, butchers of junk food pigs, over-qualified professionals of culture and education on the cheap, workers in sweatshirts or new proletarians of the delocalized digital chain of customer services: this series “The new proletarians” paints the portrait of a new world of exploited and precarious work.
For 24 years, Chantal Bélanger has been putting sleeve heads on high-end men’s jackets. As his Montreal employer, Empire Clothing, did not accept that The duty visits the factory in his company, the sewing machine operator gestures, seated in the kitchen of her small house in Saint-Hubert, to explain the nature of her task.
“In our jargon, we call them “bananas”. I sew it inside the sleeve, it makes the shoulders more straight,” says the imposing 63-year-old worker with short hair, wearing a powder blue t-shirt and small earrings.
In the factory located on rue Saint-Denis, at the corner of boulevard Rosemont, real assembly line work takes place. Each sewing machine operator is responsible for a small step in the production of high-end jackets.
“For example, the girl who works on the machine that picks pockets, she strictly picks pockets,” says the one who is also a union representative.
Since his very beginnings in this company, Mr.me Bélanger uses his strength of character to defend the comfort and respect of his colleagues against bosses and foremen.
“It’s very hard work,” she says bluntly. At my post, I have a press that gives off heat behind me and another in front, and there is the afternoon sun beating down through the windows. It’s very hot. In the summer, we leave the factory and the crook of our elbows are full of dust, which emerges from the fabrics. There’s a lot of noise, too. »
Not to mention the numerous injuries caused by repetitive movements, that Mr.me Bélanger calls them “bugs”: tendinitis, bursitis, epicondylitis… “As we are always a little bent over, many sewing machine operators will develop a bump in the upper back, which we call “the seamstress bump “”, reports the one who is now a grandmother.
All this for a salary barely higher than the minimum wage. With 24 years of seniority and 46 years in the business, Mme Bélanger earns $16 an hour creating suits that sell for several hundred dollars. The median salary for a sewing machine operator in Quebec last year was $13.50, according to the Government of Canada’s Job Bank site, the equivalent of the minimum wage.
“A lot of people in my factory have two jobs. In the evenings or on the weekends, they work as security guards, in housekeeping or in a restaurant”, underlines the one who says herself to have a tight budget.
A history of exploitation
Chantal and her colleagues are somehow survivors of the industrial era of the early twentiethand century, during which clothing and textiles were at the center of Montreal’s economy. Melanie Leavitt, administrator at the Mile End Memories organization, explored this history in detail, in particular because of her family connection with trade unionist Léa Roback, who played a key role during the seamstresses’ strike of April 1937.
“Their working conditions were miserable. They were piled up in an extremely hot environment. They even had difficulty getting permission to go to the bathroom, ”says the history buff.
The mobilization of more than 5,000 women members of the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union (UIOVD), which lasted about three weeks, resulted in them obtaining better wages and reduced hours worked, among other things.
At the time, this labor body was essentially made up of French-Canadian women and European Jewish immigrants. “The journey of garment workers is linked to the history of cultural communities in Montreal. It was the entry point into the labor market for successive waves of immigration, underlines Mme Leavitt. Not only were they women, but they were mostly racialized. »
In the 1970s and 1980s, these trades were largely occupied by Quebecers, Portuguese, Italians and Haitians, says Ms.me Belanger. And today ? “Out of approximately 260 workers, we are 10 Quebecers of origin. There are a lot of Asians: Vietnamese, Chinese… Some come from Cambodia or Bangladesh,” notes the worker, adding that the majority of them do not have many other options to put butter on the table. Since she did not complete high school, Ms.me Bélanger are also limited.
Closures and relocation
Chantal Bélanger witnessed the decline of the clothing manufacturing industry. At least five of the companies she worked for since the mid-1970s have closed or moved production to Asia, where labor is cheaper.
By the mid-1970s, the UIOVD had 22,000 members, according to its union heir, the Union of Service Employees, Local 800 (UES 800). Today, the SEU 800 garment workers division is made up of approximately 4,000 union members.
“On rue Chabanel, the big buildings were full of factories. Today, there is hardly any of that anymore,” notes the sewing machine operator.
It is now in China and Bangladesh that the sweatshops have been moved, she denounces. “We reproduce there the same operating conditions against which our great-grandmothers fought very hard”, laments for his part Mme Leavitt.
Despite everything, the Quebec clothing industry is facing a labor shortage. At Empire Clothing, the vice president of production, Emanuele Gozzo, estimates that there are about thirty operators short.
“We advertise everywhere, including in ethnic newspapers. We offer to train people even if they don’t have experience,” says Mr. Gozzo. He says the company has to turn down contracts for lack of staff.
Because, despite the robotization of certain tasks, such as cutting fabrics, “a sewing machine is still a sewing machine”, says Mme Belanger. Humans are always needed to operate them with care.
Chantal Bélanger will also contribute to the shortage of personnel at the plant, since she has decided to leave it. She will end her career as an office worker for her union. A young colleague will defend the rights of workers in the factory in his place. To this succession, she is very grateful.