2010-09-22
Nicholas Keung
For years, Paul Roach spent eight months away from his family in Jamaica to work on an apple farm in Ontario.
This year was his last.
On Sept. 10, while producing apple cider at the Ayton, Ont. farm, the 44-year-old migrant worker climbed into a giant tank to fix a pump and was overcome by gas.
Fellow migrant worker Ralston White, 36, also from Jamaica, jumped in and collapsed as well.
Toronto Sun
For years, Paul Roach spent eight months away from his family in Jamaica to work on an apple farm in Ontario.
This year was his last.
On Sept. 10, while producing apple cider at the Ayton, Ont. farm, the 44-year-old migrant worker climbed into a giant tank to fix a pump and was overcome by gas.
Fellow migrant worker Ralston White, 36, also from Jamaica, jumped in and collapsed as well.
“They were in the process of making apple cider, emptying a tank by way of pumping the remainder of the juice into a smaller tanker,” said Larkland Stone of the Jamaican Liaison Service in Toronto, whose office coordinates the import of farm workers to Canada.
“The pump stopped. Mr. Roach climbed inside to check on it and collapsed. Then Mr. White also climbed into the tank. He, too, succumbed.”
The two are the latest of 33 reported migrant fatalities in Ontario’s seasonal agricultural workers’ program in the past decade, according to the advocacy group, Justicia for Migrant Workers.
Another 1,129 have been sent home due to illness or injuries suffered in Ontario, said Justicia spokesman Chris Ramsaroop.
Now advocates for migrant workers are demanding an inquest into these deaths. A protest is planned Friday at the Ministry of Labour offices in Toronto to push for stronger safety enforcement on farms.
“We need an inquest to ensure their deaths are not forgotten,” Ramsaroop said. “Migrant workers do not have the same freedom to assert their rights. Agriculture is still one of the most dangerous occupations.”
The labour ministry could not confirm the fatality numbers because it does not keep separate statistics on migrant workers. Ministry spokesman Matt Blajer said foreign workers are protected by the same laws and the province regularly inspects Ontario farms.
White and Roach were killed at Filsinger’s Organic Foods & Orchards in Ayton, 100 kilometres northwest of Kitchener. An autopsy confirmed the cause of death as “environmental suffocation” or asphyxia.
It was Roach’s sixth year and White’s seventh at Filsinger’s. They each leave behind a wife and two children.
Both families will be compensated by the Workplace Safety and Insurance Board, with burial and repatriation costs covered, Stone said.
The United Food and Commercial Workers union sent a letter to Ontario chief coroner Dr. Andrew McCallum, demanding an inquest. There has been no inquest into any migrant farm worker death to date, said UFCW’s farm worker coordinator Stan Raper.
Although Ontario has implemented “agricultural visits” since 2006, the majority of audits are on veterinary clinics, topsoil operations, tree services and kennels, instead of commercial farms where most migrant workers work and live, Raper said.
“It’s a political move by the government to go anywhere but a farm,” said Raper. “It is good to know that your pets are safe, but how about the safety of our farm workers?”
A spokesperson for the coroner’s office declined to comment, citing privacy of the deceased men.
Some 25,000 Caribbean and Mexican workers are brought in each year to spend eight months working in Canadian farms. They go home and return the following year.
Agriculture and horticulture workers
Casos documentados de abuso
Conciencia Pública
Ontario y Jamaica
Inglés