By Anna Mehler Paperny

TORONTO, (Reuters) – As the COVID-19 pandemic raged in Canada, inspectors often found that employers of migrant workers were compliant with safety and health rules, despite a dearth of evidence. This was according to an Auditor General Report released Thursday.

Canadian provinces, territories have their own housing regulations. However, it is the responsibility of the federal government to make sure that many thousands of migrants farmworkers are provided with adequate accommodation.

Employment and Social Development Canada conducts reviews of workplaces and living spaces. Most of the inspections conducted since April 2020 were done electronically. Canada had 99.6% compliance in 2020; it reached 100% in 2021.

Karen Hogan, Auditor General, warned that inspection issues would arise in 2020. However, things have worsened. 88% of the quarantine inspections were deemed problematic, compared to 73% last year.

Hogan claimed in an interview, “I believe they had lots of information and really ought to have acted upon it. And I’m disappointed that the situation didn’t improve.”

“It is a very big failure.”

Migrant workers were hard hit by the COVID-19 epidemic. Many lived in communal settings, which fueled transmission. Mexico has attempted to improve worker protection by changing Canada’s Seasonal Agricultural Workers Program in light of the recent floods and wildfires in British Columbia.

Eighty percent (of the COVID-19 infection inspections that the auditor examined) remained inactive despite the fact that they were required to respond quickly to worker safety. Audit said that sometimes inspectors found information which indicated non-compliance with pandemic regulations, but still declared employers to be compliant.

Employment and Social Development Canada agreed with the audit’s recommendations.

The Temporary Foreign Worker Program is not intended to handle a pandemic. In order to deal with a pandemic, regulations, procedures and training needed to be created in real time,” the Department stated in an audit statement.

Canada’s agricultural sector, worth C$68.8 million ($54.2 billion), heavily depends on migrants. Between March 2020 and June 20,21, more than 79,000 immigrants arrived in Canada to work as agricultural workers.

Hogan stated that migrant workers can also be “human beings” who rely on their employers to provide accommodations.

($1 = 1.2695 Canadian dollars)