Workers in Quebec say employers need to 'sweeten the deal' to get them back

For years, Marceline Adkins spent long hours in restaurants — working her way up from dishwasher to line cook for about $15 per hour.

While she says she had to beg for two weeks off each year, she saw friends work jobs with both more flexible hours and better pay. So in 2021, she left the restaurant industry for good to pursue her music career and freelance work.

To entice workers like her, Adkins says employers need to offer better wages and benefits.

"They just need to sweeten the deal," she said.

From bars and restaurants reducing their hours to chaos at airports, employers across Quebec are seeking workers. In April 2022, Quebec had the ​​second-highest number of job vacancies in Canada while having the lowest unemployment rate.

The province tried to fill the gaps by increasing recruitment abroad and employers are putting kids as young as 11 years old to work, but the need is still acute.

"When I was younger I thought, 'I'm young, I'm inexperienced, this is a job,' but then as time goes on you're still making roughly the same amount of money, your hours still suck, you're just stuck somewhere," said Adkins.

Adkins isn't alone in wanting better working conditions.

Matthew Ohayon spent over two years working his dream job at Bell Media, but left to be a copywriter at a bank last month.

"One of my priorities that I made clear to my boss after getting good grounding was that I want to be a full-time employee. I need benefits, I want better pay — all the fancy stuff that comes with a full-time gig. And it just never happened for me," he said.

So he left for a full-time position elsewhere with higher pay, better hours and the benefits he needed.

"I spend seven and a half hours at my job then I have 16 hours to do whatever I want and live however I want. That's probably the best part of it," said Ohayon.

Philippe Rainville, president and CEO of Aéroports de Montréal, said Trudeau Airport is "getting closer and closer to having sufficient staff" but there's not enough people to meet current demand and retaining employees can be difficult.

"We've boosted salaries, we have bonuses, we have all sorts of retention mechanisms," Rainville told CBC Montreal News at 6 anchor Debra Arbec. "Until the system recovers, it's going to be difficult."