A class action lawsuit against the Government of Canada brought forward on behalf of 75,000 migrant workers can proceed to trial, Justice Edward M. Morgan decided in February.
Workers hired under the Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program (SAWP) after 2008 allege the federal government “has been unjustly enriched by hundreds of millions of dollars in Employment Insurance premiums paid,” according to Justicia for Migrant Workers. They say this violates their Charter rights.
“Prior to the emergence of the SAWP program in the 1960s, agricultural workers came, they had the ability to live here as equals, they had the ability for permanent residency,” Chris Ramsaroop, with Justice for Migrant Workers, told CBC News. “We’re saying the same thing should happen for agricultural workers today.”
The ruling notes that in 1966, the Minister of Immigration at the time said in Parliament that the SAWP would amount to enslavement if it were implemented on Europeans.
“The content of what Minister Marchand is quoted as saying is indeed controversial,” Justice Morgan wrote in his decision to allow the case. “In fact, today one could consider the racist connotations of his speech to be outrageous. But the fact that he said it, and that he said it nearly simultaneously with his endorsement of the SAWP, is not controversial. It is historical fact.”
The federal government told CBC News that workers in insurable employment “pay EI premiums regardless of the industry in which they are employed and irrespective of whether they have an expectation of receiving benefits.”
This article appeared in the 2026 Apr/May issue.