The $80 million bank loan to finance PharmHouse’s venture was, in 2019, amongst the largest ever offered in the cannabis industry.
Now, a group of farm workers is fighting to recover thousands of dollars in unpaid entitlements, according to documents recently provided to PharmHouse’s insolvency proceedings.
Former PharmHouse worker O’Niel Robinson has lodged a claim of $7,500, the maximum allowable amount under the federal wage-earner protection program that exists to protect employees during bankruptcies.
Unbeknownst to Robinson, PharmHouse was insolvent — and its sudden closure constituted a mass termination.
Even had those debts been documented, the address on file for PharmHouse’s migrant workers was the now-defunct farm — making it impossible for the insolvency trustee to proactively reach out.
These include allegations that temporary foreign workers sometimes worked up to 88 hours a week with no overtime pay.
In interviews with the Star, three former employees described their bunkhouses as overcrowded and at times unsanitary.