Workers and Boycotters Occupy Labour Minister’s Posh Luncheon

On February 20 at noon, activists from the "Here we Boycott Amazon" campaign occupied a luncheon hosted by Quebec Labour Minister Jean Boulet. The event was being held in a grand ballroom in Quebec City's Chateau Frontenac hotel. 

The Labour Minister' s appearance at the luncheon was scheduled as part of a weekend congress for Quebec's Corporation of General Entrepreneurs. At the event, Boulet would speak before the province's wealthiest construction firms and related industry professionals.

According to a statement on the boycott campaign's Facebook page, the activists and Amazon workers were able to speak with Boulet face to face after 20 minutes of demonstrating. They demanded he commit to using executive power to begin meeting the campaign's demands. 

While Boulet paid lip service to hearing out the campaign's demands and exploring options to support workers who lost their livelihoods to Amazon's warehouse closures, he made no solid commitments.

Boulet suggesting instead that the demonstrators take their case to Quebec's Administrative Labour Tribunal, a process which could take years.

Félix Trudeau, President of the STTAL, which represents Amazon workers in Laval, stated: "[Boulet] refuses to take a stand for workers, as did [Premier] Legault when the closures were first announced. By hiding behind his supposedly neutral non-position, he's functionally taking a stand for multinationals."

"We met with Minister Boulet and told him that the Quebec government has a duty to act in the face of Amazon's blatant disregard of our laws," added campaign co-spokesperson André-Philippe Doré. "To him, that's not the kind of issue the Quebec government should intervene in. He thinks that tribunals are the only way to get Quebec laws and the public respected when he has the power to do more right now!"

Under the Quebec Civil Code's Expropriation Act, government bodies such as the provincial government can expropriate private property in the public interest. 

Using these powers, the provincial government could take ownership of all of the shuttered Amazon warehouses. These warehouses could be repurposed for public benefit, as long as the expropriated party receives "full and fair compensation."

The construction, utilities, and tax burden of Amazon's Quebec infrastructure were heavily subsidized with public money.

Boulet's refusal to commit to such an expropriation should hardly come as a surprise. The luncheon, after all, took place in a room full of contractors and lawyers whose wealthy landholding clients would vehemently oppose such an assault on the sanctity of private property, 

Just the day before this action, Boulet's government announced Bill 89, which expands the government's powers to force striking public employees back to work.