New anti-exploitation crackdown in Saskatchewan yields first conviction

The provincial courthouse in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan. Photo by Heywood Yu/Regina Leader-Post/Postmedia

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A Saskatchewan employer has been fined $5,000 in one of the first successful convictions obtained as part of a provincial effort to crack down on foreign worker exploitation.

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On Tuesday, representatives for Dyan Jeny Enterprises pleaded guilty in a Moose Jaw, Sask. court to demanding $12,000 from an employee as a condition of maintaining his Canadian work permit.

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Parth Patel, a foreign national working at Moose Jaw’s Guac Mexi Grill, was told that he would lose his job and potentially his immigration status unless he paid $12,000 to his employers.

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In addition to the $5,000 fine, Dyan Jeny Enterprises was also ordered to repay the $12,000.

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According to a report on the case by DiscoverMooseJaw, Provincial Court Judge Steven Schiefner questioned whether a $5,000 fine was sufficient deterrence for such a clear case of worker exploitation.

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“I find the conduct of Dyan Jeny Enterprises and its principals to be atrocious,” Schiefner told the court.

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Notably, the court would hear that illegally charging fees to foreign workers was considered common practice in Saskatchewan.

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Last October, the charges against Dyan Jeny Enterprises were touted by the Saskatchewan government as the first prosecution pursued under a new provincial law intended to prevent the exploitation of foreign workers.

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The Immigration Services Act, which became law in July, 2024, was announced as “the most comprehensive program integrity framework in the nation, including the highest fines for violation in the country.”

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When first tabled before the Saskatchewan Legislative Assembly, a statement by the province’s Immigration and Career Training Ministry said it was part of their overall program to obtain “autonomy over immigration” and to grow the province’s population to 1.4 million  by 2030.

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Under the new law, individual violators can be slapped with fines of up to $750,000, as well as imprisonment of up to two years. Corporations can face fines of up to $1,250,000.

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In addition, if the infraction affects “more than one foreign national,” each victim is counted as a separate offence.

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However, since the alleged Dyan Jeny Enterprise infractions all occurred before the Immigration Services Act was proclaimed into law, the charges ultimately had to be pursued under the more lenient 2013 legislation that the Immigration Services Act had replaced.

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As a result, the stricter consequences of the new law never ended up applying.

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In addition, most of the charges laid in October were eventually withdrawn, including a charge that Patel’s employers had taken “unfair advantage of a foreign national’s trust or exploit a foreign national’s fear or lack of experience or knowledge.”

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The Moose Jaw decision occurs shortly after another landmark Saskatchewan case involving foreign labour.

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Just last week, two Saskatchewan men, Mohammed Masum, 44, and Sohel Haider, 55, were convicted of human trafficking in the case of a Bangladeshi woman first brought to the province as a foreign worker. Prosecutors said it was the first case of labour human trafficking ever heard by a Saskatchewan court.

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