This is a strange name for the 86-metre-long boring machine we see depicted on this cake. Ten years ago on June 10, 2006, this cake was part of the celebration to christen this machine that would bore 2 tunnels beginning on the south side of False Creek (Olympic Village Station), continuing under False Creek to Yaletown-Roundhouse Station, Vancouver City Centre Station and finally connecting with Waterfront Station. It weighed 440 tonnes and could bore 10 metres per day. These stations are part of today’s Canada Line, built in time to service the 2010 Olympics hosted by Vancouver.
This powerful beast of a machine was softened by its name and this is due to Brendan Henry, who was chief engineer of the boring operation. He named it after his four-year-old daughter, Leilani Henry. He felt this was a new adventurous project and since his daughter was an adventurous girl, the name was born.
There’s no doubt as to the need and success of the Canada Line as well as SkyTrain’s Expo and Millennium Lines. However, the tunnel drilling by Sweet Leilani was not without controversy, particularly in terms of hiring practices.
The Canada Line was built by SNC-Lavalin, a Montreal-based company. They worked with SELI Canada, an international tunnel building company based in Italy. They used temporary workers from Costa Rica, Ecuador and Columbia who worked alongside Spanish, Portuguese and Italian workers. All these workers constructed the boring machine and worked on excavations. However, the temporary workers from Latin America were initially being paid less than $5/hour for a 65-hour workweek. Incredibly, for the first time in Canadian history, these Latin American construction workers successfully exercised their right to form a union. Before they could bargain, however, SNC and SELI increased workers’ wages to $14.21/ hour and the workweek was reduced to 40 hours with overtime allowances as required by BC labour law. $14.21 was still half of what the European workers were being paid for exactly the same work!
After almost two years of litigation, the BC Human Rights Tribunal ruled that migrant workers must not suffer wage discrimination based on low wage labour markets in their countries of origin. The workers were awarded compensation for their difference in wages from the European workers, plus punitive damages. However, SELI appealed to the BC Supreme Court and the workers finally settled for half of the original award. In addition to all this, The B.C. and Yukon Building and Construction Trades Council were upset Canadian workers were not being used on the tunnel portion of the Canada Line.
The issue of temporary foreign workers in Canada and their potential abuse in terms of working conditions and wages continues today. The temptation to pay lower wages and exercise less than ideal working conditions hurts not only foreign workers but threatens the stability of jobs for Canadian workers who need a decent minimum wage and proper training to actively engage in today’s work force.
On another note, because of the background of the foreign workers on the Canada Line tunnel, there was a small shrine to the Virgin Mary tied to a ladder on the wall just outside the construction area. It was a place to ask protection for many reasons. The shrine and other photos related to Sweet Leilani can be viewed below.
