While most people were enjoying a nice relaxing long Easter Weekend, border guards were busy dealing with an increase in asylum seekers trying to cross into Quebec.
Jean Pierre Fortin, National President of the Customs and Immigration Union, said that since the weather warmed up agents have seen an average of 150 people trying to cross each day. That's up from the 50 to 60 during the winter months.
But between March 29 and April 2 about 600 refugee claimants arrived at the Lacolle border.
Fortin said right now border guards don't have the resources to deal with those kinds of numbers.
Unlike last summer, when the majority of people crossing the border were from Haiti, most of this weekend's asylum seekers were from Nigeria.
Many of them are recent arrivals to the U.S. with visitor visas, which have since expired.
As Quebec prepares to see another increase in claimants, Immigration minister David Heurtel's press officer told The Canadian Press in an email Thursday the province has yet to receive formal response from the federal government for the reimbursement of the costs from last summer's wave.
No negotiations have been initiated so far.