Juno News - August 04, 2022


Chaos in Canada’s airports (Ft. Duncan Dee)


Episode Stats


Length

25 minutes

Words per minute

160.41881

Word count

4,101

Sentence count

178

Harmful content

Hate speech

1

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Duncan D. is the former Chief Operating Officer of Air Canada and a well-known commentator on issues related to travel and tourism. He's been extremely critical about the Trudeau government's handling of the current situation at our airports.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 Hi guys, welcome back to the show. I hope you're enjoying a great summer and enjoying the warm
00:00:24.680 weather wherever it is you are in the country. Normally, this time of year, many of us, many
00:00:31.440 Canadians travel abroad and many visitors come to Canada. But if you've been keeping up with the
00:00:37.480 news, you will have noted what a disaster air travel has become. To be fair, it's a situation
00:00:43.900 that's not just unique to Canadian airports. The disaster at airports seems to be a worldwide
00:00:50.180 phenomenon affecting all major airports across the world. To talk about the situation at our
00:00:57.100 airports, I can't think of anyone more qualified than Duncan D. Duncan D. is the former Chief
00:01:03.820 Operating Officer of Air Canada and a well-known commentator on issues related to travel and
00:01:10.280 tourism. He's been extremely critical about the Trudeau government's handling of the current
00:01:15.140 situation at our airports. So please welcome Duncan D. to the show. Hey Duncan, so it's great
00:01:21.940 to have you here. There's so much to talk about, but maybe we can start with the mess at our
00:01:28.240 airports. You may remember that back in the spring, our Transportation Minister, Omar Al-Gabra,
00:01:35.760 claimed that out-of-practice travelers were responsible for the airport delays. Essentially,
00:01:42.400 I believe shifting the blame to the poor traveler and excusing the government's own failures.
00:01:49.660 What did you think of what Minister Al-Gabra said back then? And more broadly, what do you think
00:01:56.140 have been the main failures from the government that's led to the current mess?
00:02:02.680 Thanks Rupa. So I think that the root of the problem really was when Minister Al-Gabra started blaming
00:02:10.980 out-of-practice travelers for the mess at the airports. Because when you start out by blaming
00:02:17.900 the users for the problems in the system, it signals really to everyone that you don't recognize
00:02:26.080 the problems are yours. And so the issues we've seen at the airports have been very, very consistent,
00:02:32.840 primarily in Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver, with CATSA lines that have spanned upwards of three
00:02:38.860 hours at the worst of times, aircraft holding off gate two to three hours whenever things have
00:02:45.780 backed up at the customs hall. And so what we've seen now for almost four months are consistent delays
00:02:52.960 in the processing of travelers, both on departure at security and on arrival at customs and immigration.
00:03:00.120 Yeah. So, yeah, he was definitely, I mean, it certainly came across that way to me that he was
00:03:08.300 not looking at the situation at the airports and the way the government's been handling it and just
00:03:13.300 shifting the blame to the travelers. And, you know, I'd like to point to something that I was reading in
00:03:19.880 the news recently. The Wall Street Journal recently reported that Toronto's Pearson has earned the
00:03:26.860 dubious distinction of being the world's worst this summer, I believe with more than 50% of flights
00:03:33.800 arriving late the last few weeks, making it even worse than Heathrow, Frankfurt, and all other major
00:03:41.320 airports. But the government's standard defense, again, going back to Minister Al-Gabra, you know,
00:03:47.660 whether it comes to the airport situation or to inflation, everybody else is, everyone is having
00:03:54.520 the same problems. It's not just unique to us. Certainly, there's no question that major airports
00:04:01.140 like Heathrow have had some well-publicized problems this summer. But do you think this is a fair comment
00:04:08.140 by the government? Or do you think it's just a cop-out for their own failure to fix the system?
00:04:14.380 Look, I think it's an absolute cop-out. If you take a look at that list published by the Wall Street
00:04:20.220 Journal, of the top 10 airports, there were two in North America. Number one was Pearson by a wide
00:04:27.640 margin. And then number 10 was Orlando Airport at the very bottom, where they've experienced actually
00:04:33.640 some weather issues in the last little while. And the only other non-European airport on that list
00:04:39.080 was Sydney, Australia, which has had some issues that they've dealt with, particularly regarding
00:04:45.740 labor shortages. So when you take a look at the situation, the best comparators to Pearson would,
00:04:53.080 in normal times, be JFK in New York, O'Hare Airport in Chicago, Atlanta Airport, or, you know,
00:05:00.980 maybe if you wanted even LaGuardia Airport, which isn't an international airport, but is still a
00:05:06.640 major airport in the US. None of those airports are in the top 10 worst delayed airports in the world,
00:05:13.180 but Pearson is. And so, you know, the notion that Canada is just one of many doesn't really hold
00:05:18.940 water, especially when Pearson stands head and shoulders above the second airport on that list,
00:05:25.920 which would have been Heathrow Airport, where they've been facing significant issues.
00:05:29.560 So, you know, I think that it's a definite cop-out. I think what the government has done
00:05:34.660 is basically tried to wash its hands of what's happened at the airports, but the airports and
00:05:40.420 the travelers won't let them forget it. So what exactly makes Pearson one of the worst in the world
00:05:46.760 right now to transit through or to arrive or leave or depart from? What are issues that are specific
00:05:56.420 to Pearson that, you know, one doesn't experience, say, in Orlando or in Sydney, for that matter?
00:06:03.200 Well, like, I mean, Rupa, I think that that is an excellent question. And if you just take a look
00:06:08.240 at the headlines, for example, you know, a few days ago, USA Today had a story how travelers in Maui,
00:06:16.280 Hawaii, were waiting an hour before clearing security at the airport. And somehow that was worthy 0.93
00:06:22.420 of reporting. Well, at Pearson Airport, we've had days and days and weeks and weeks of travelers
00:06:27.940 taking three hours or more to get through security first thing in the morning. And somehow, you know,
00:06:33.720 an hour at Maui is worthy of a newspaper headline. But, you know, like the bottom line is, is I think
00:06:40.280 that what makes Pearson different is the cumulative impact of the delays that we've seen at Pearson
00:06:45.260 for, for almost four months now, these delays started at least the first I observed personally
00:06:51.260 was on the fourth, sorry, the second of April. So almost four months ago, you know, where you've
00:06:57.920 had where we had a three hour delay on a Saturday morning in April, when there really shouldn't have
00:07:02.440 been delays at all. You know, April is not a heavy travel month in Canada, as you know, Rupa, but we
00:07:09.020 still saw a three hour long lineup at security on a Saturday morning in April. That has not changed
00:07:15.080 since April at Pearson. We've had delays like that virtually every day, either at customs or at
00:07:21.400 security. You've had aircraft holding off gate. You've had travelers waiting in huge lines. And so
00:07:28.380 it's really not been any different. And when you have the cumulative impact of that cascading into the
00:07:35.240 peak summer travel period, like we were seeing now, where travel is booming in terms of the number
00:07:41.220 of travelers taken to the skies, it's really just a product of what we've seen that has been taking
00:07:48.060 place for such a long time. So Duncan, is it is it just international travel that's been the most
00:07:54.660 affected? Or is it just also also domestic travel? So if I were to get on a plane here from Ottawa to
00:08:00.900 Fredericton, New Brunswick, am I going to have these issues at security, at security and, and, and,
00:08:09.140 you know, you know, when I'm going to pick up my luggage? Or is it just, is it's, or is it both
00:08:16.560 domestic and international travel that have been severely affected?
00:08:21.580 No, look, it's a great, great question. And the reason why the situation is affecting both
00:08:28.780 international and domestic traveler travelers is because international air, there are no such
00:08:35.680 thing as international only aircraft or domestic only aircraft at airlines in Canada, you've got
00:08:42.340 aircraft that may have started their day in LaGuardia airport. And then they went through
00:08:48.940 Toronto before they got to Ottawa to then go from Ottawa to Fredericton. And so when you've got that
00:08:54.020 situation where aircraft are moving around the system day in and day out, that's where the
00:08:59.660 cumulative impact of this that we're seeing. So let's just say that the flight that you were taking
00:09:04.960 illustratively from Ottawa to Fredericton, if that aircraft started in Montreal or Toronto before it
00:09:12.060 got to Ottawa, it could have been delayed, which would have meant that your delay, your flight would
00:09:17.140 have been delayed from Ottawa to Fredericton. And because that flight was delayed, then the Fredericton
00:09:22.500 back to Ottawa flight would be delayed as well. And so, you know, the ecosystem that's the air
00:09:27.780 transportation sector in Canada is very much intertwined. You've got flights coming in from
00:09:32.940 any destination, international or domestic, that eventually, at some point, pass to, through,
00:09:40.520 or from either Montreal or Toronto airport, which are the two worst affected airports during the
00:09:46.860 federal service failures we've seen over the last four months.
00:09:49.580 Right. I mean, for sure, there's a cascading effect when it comes to these things, even in the best,
00:09:54.600 during the best of times. And I can only imagine, I can't even imagine what the situation right now
00:09:59.860 is. But I wanted to ask you, you know, it's been a month since the Trudeau government announced this
00:10:08.660 task force, I believe, to fix the mess at the airports. And also, I believe, the passport offices.
00:10:14.280 Do you have any sense of what's been going on with this task force? Do you think that the government
00:10:21.060 is actually serious about fixing these problems? Or do you think the task force is going to be just
00:10:27.480 another eye wash?
00:10:29.780 Well, look, the task force was announced on the 25th of June. The minister who was co-chairing the task
00:10:37.820 task force, Marcy Ian from Toronto, said that she wanted to see something tangible within weeks. Well,
00:10:44.520 it's been a month, and we haven't seen anything tangible come out of the task force. The only
00:10:49.360 thing we've seen tangible at the passport office from the task force seems to be they've ordered new
00:10:54.720 chairs to deal with the lineups, but they've not extended the opening hours of the passport offices.
00:11:00.880 Right. Just going back to the delays at the airports, the mess at the airports, how much of that has to
00:11:11.000 do with labor shortages? Certainly, that's something that we've been hearing from, you know, from other
00:11:18.160 airports. You know, here at Pearson, I believe I've heard some officials saying that they just weren't
00:11:28.420 prepared for all of the travelers coming back. They had to lay off many people at the beginning of
00:11:37.300 the pandemic, and they haven't rehired these people. So is that a fair, you know, do we accept that as
00:11:45.100 a plausible situation?
00:11:48.620 Well, you know, it's interesting that they started blaming labor shortages a little bit late in the game.
00:11:55.680 You know, very early on, when the minister was blaming travelers, he said he had enough staff.
00:12:01.840 He said he had 90% of his pre-pandemic workforce at security, dealing with less than 70% of the
00:12:09.880 pre-pandemic air traffic. So he had more staff dealing with fewer travelers than he did before
00:12:15.620 the pandemic, and then he still got three-hour lines. So that shifted after that initial comment to,
00:12:21.460 he's now short, he started by saying he was short 600 security screeners, then it became 800 security
00:12:28.100 screeners, then it became 1,000, and then he settled in at 1,200 security screeners that he was
00:12:33.220 missing. So it ballooned from 600 to 1,200 in about six weeks, in terms of what he said he was missing.
00:12:40.120 Incredible. Yeah.
00:12:40.900 Yeah. And so, you know, either his workforce got that much more inefficient during the pandemic,
00:12:47.440 which, you know, the only conclusion you can come to is that, or really things are just so messed up
00:12:53.420 that, you know, he's needing more people to do the same amount of work or even less work than he did
00:12:59.980 before the pandemic.
00:13:00.800 Mm-hmm. And, you know, I wanted to switch gears a little bit and talk about Aright Can or Aright
00:13:08.420 Can't, as it's popularly known these days. Many of us hope that this app would just be retired for
00:13:15.080 good once the pandemic abated. But there seems to be no such luck. The government seems to want to
00:13:22.860 make it permanent. And I believe they're sneakily going to bundle this with customs declaration
00:13:28.980 into the app. And, and of course, you know, I'm sure you're aware of this, that the app has had
00:13:34.700 some very notorious glitches, including sending vaccinated passengers into quarantine. And, and,
00:13:42.820 you know, as far as cross-border travel is concerned, you can bet your bottom dollar that
00:13:46.860 Americans, for example, are not going to be interested in using this app for just a short visit. It just
00:13:52.960 makes no sense. And recently, an NDP MP, I believe, Brian Massey, you know, criticized Aright Can. And
00:14:03.420 he said that this is not about public safety. It's being used as, in quote, to quote him,
00:14:09.520 backdoor to permanently track all border crossings. And it's not worthy this critique is coming from
00:14:17.220 the government's allies that are, you know, propping up the Trudeau government and not from the
00:14:22.180 conservatives. What do you think of what Massey has been saying about the app? And do you think
00:14:28.340 that this will, you know, given that the fact that it's coming from the NDP, you think that the Trudeau
00:14:34.140 government may rethink it? You know, look, I think what Brian Massey said was stunning, because as you
00:14:41.980 point out, these are the government's own allies that are keeping them in power. But the one thing that
00:14:47.100 didn't surprise me was that Brian Massey represents a border community. You know, he's from Windsor.
00:14:52.180 And border mayors have been the most consistent, loudest voices against Arrive Can since Arrive Can
00:14:59.440 was created. You know, the border mayors have seen the impact that Arrive Can has had on their
00:15:05.680 communities very firsthand. And so they're the ones who are saying, let's stop this nonsense.
00:15:11.100 In terms of what's happened at the airports, you know, none other than the CBSA union, the union
00:15:18.320 representing CBSA customs officers have come out and said that 30 to 40 percent of travelers arriving
00:15:25.500 at the airports don't have the app completed or don't have it completed correctly. And so you've got
00:15:32.460 the situation where, you know, criticism is coming from health experts, border experts, border mayors,
00:15:40.620 now you've got an NDP member of parliament joining the fray. You know, it's really difficult to see why
00:15:46.460 the government wants to make this app permanent, but not just permanent, but mandatory. You know,
00:15:52.840 if they have an app, you know, I've often said the government can have an app, a kiosk, or even mental
00:15:57.780 telepathy. As long as they don't make it mandatory, it's fine. People can choose to use it if it really
00:16:03.520 saves time. But this is an app that the government decided has to be used by travelers.
00:16:09.480 What purpose does it serve at this point? I've used the app when I, you know, when I had to use it
00:16:14.980 when I went overseas back in April. And, you know, I don't even, I don't recall whether anybody even
00:16:22.600 checked to see if I was fully vaccinated, but I don't even know how it worked. I can't recall
00:16:27.700 this anymore. But what purpose is it serving right now? And why is the government doubling down
00:16:33.860 on Arrive Can when clearly there have been so many issues? And what does MP Massey mean when he says
00:16:43.260 this is being used to track border crossings? Why would you want to track border crossings? What's
00:16:50.060 the agenda there? Well, look, I think that that's an excellent question. So let's start at the
00:16:56.120 beginning what it was supposed to do. So if we could start at the very beginning of Arrive Can,
00:17:02.320 when it was first started, it was billed as a time-saving device that would be used by travelers
00:17:08.880 to upload their personal vaccine information so that it could be verified by government ahead of
00:17:16.500 time before people arrived at the border. And so, you know, the initial use of it was as a voluntary
00:17:23.440 way. Instead of showing this paper document at the border with your vaccine information,
00:17:28.820 you could do it ahead of time. And that's what it was billed as. Since that time, it went from being
00:17:35.080 a voluntary app to a mandatory app. And that app is now being made permanent. And they're, they keep on
00:17:41.580 saying they're, they're enhancing it. And you know, when a government tells you they're enhancing
00:17:45.280 something, you've got to be worried about what they mean by that. Because they're adding customs
00:17:50.340 declaration, as you said, onto this app. And, you know, at some point is, are they planning on making
00:17:55.720 the app, you know, the only way you can make your declaration when you enter Canada, which basically
00:18:01.240 means it's not just mandatory, but there's no other way of, of entering the country, except through this
00:18:07.460 app. In terms of what Massey's comment was regarding tracking of entries and exits at the border,
00:18:14.540 I think what he was meaning was that it's a backdoor way to accomplish what the government
00:18:18.500 may want to do, which is have an electronic way of tracking people coming into the border,
00:18:24.920 tracking their whereabouts when they're in Canada, and then tracking when they depart the country.
00:18:30.020 And so, you know, I'm not quite sure whether that's accurate or not. But you know, when you've
00:18:34.820 got an app that's being that's so critical to what the government keeps on saying is their border
00:18:41.000 measures, you've got to wonder what it is that their intent really is with something like this,
00:18:45.720 when the initial justification for this app is no longer valid.
00:18:50.560 Right. I mean, it sounds like, you know, if you want to track people's movements, it's not,
00:18:54.880 it's not, it's no longer about COVID-19 or fighting the pandemic, it seems to be more about
00:19:00.100 security, perhaps. And, you know, why not just say that, you know, just admit that that's what
00:19:07.300 you're trying to do, instead of using the cover of public health safety. And, yeah, and that's,
00:19:14.840 that's what's very problematic. And of course, that raises all kinds of issues. And, you know,
00:19:20.980 and I just, I just, in terms of privacy, for example, you know, I don't know where we're going
00:19:26.840 with this in terms of tracking people's movements within the country. Would that,
00:19:31.360 would that apply just to visitors? Or would, would it apply to everybody?
00:19:36.340 Well, you know, the thing that's really quite sneaky with the way the government's done this
00:19:40.060 is they've said this is a mandatory app, but then they've also said Canadians and permanent
00:19:45.460 residents who refuse to use the app can't be denied entry to the country. But then they've also said
00:19:52.520 that if you don't use the app, you can be fined $6,000 for not using it. So, you know, it's,
00:19:58.280 it's really, we're, we're charting very uncharted waters here in terms of what this app is,
00:20:06.180 what it's used for, why is it so important? Why does the government want to make it mandatory?
00:20:11.280 They've not answered very many basic questions. And I think when you've got an NDP member of
00:20:16.400 parliament from a border community like Windsor, raising those concerns, people need to pay attention
00:20:21.600 and they need to ask these questions of the government as to why it is that they're so intent on
00:20:26.980 making this app permanent, but not just permanent, mandatory, you know, that you can't enter the
00:20:32.700 country unless you use this app.
00:20:35.120 And what do you think of random testing that's now returned? We thought that they were getting rid of
00:20:42.660 it last month. I think it was temporarily put on hold and now it's come back again, or it's been in
00:20:50.260 effect since for about a week or so, if I'm not mistaken. Why are they, why are they again,
00:20:56.100 doubling down on random, randomly testing passengers? Is any country doing this anymore?
00:21:03.920 You know, 160 countries have reopened to tourism and travel since the start of the summer. And none of
00:21:12.000 them are doing mandatory random testing at the borders. You know, there, there are several countries that are
00:21:17.640 tracking new variants, which is what the minister says, the minister of health says is the justification
00:21:23.560 for mandatory random tests, random testing, but they're tracking those new variants using other
00:21:29.320 methods like testing of wastewater at airports or testing of wastewater in the community to track
00:21:36.480 the arrival of new variants. They're not randomly testing travelers. You know, four infectious disease
00:21:44.360 physicians came out and wrote an op-ed piece that basically said these pandemic checks are doing no
00:21:51.440 good anymore. But yet the government still wants to persist in, in these checks, which really aren't
00:21:56.620 doing anything other than causing disruption and delays at the airport. Imagine if you're a traveler
00:22:01.580 coming in from Europe, recently recovered from COVID. And everybody knows that you can test positive
00:22:08.420 for COVID months after your last infection using a PCR test. And yet the government wants to test these
00:22:15.960 travelers. And what traveler is going to subject themselves to that test with a risk that they would be
00:22:22.220 forced into a 10 day quarantine if they test positive?
00:22:26.700 Yeah. So speaking of which, do you have any sense of how tourism is performing this summer at all?
00:22:34.500 Are we seeing an increase in tourists this year compared to the last couple of years? I'm thinking
00:22:42.520 for sure, a lot more people are traveling this summer, given that there's been a loosening of travel
00:22:48.980 restrictions around the world. But how are we doing in terms of tourism? Are we getting,
00:22:54.940 how are we compared to other countries, for example?
00:22:57.840 Well, you know, all I can quote are some statistics that were used by a US congressman
00:23:05.860 representing the Buffalo area, where he said that traffic across the Canada US border in his area
00:23:13.160 was down 50% from what it was pre-pandemic. So yes, people are traveling now versus what they were
00:23:21.140 during the deaths of the pandemic. But compared to what it was before the pandemic started,
00:23:26.580 you know, the numbers are very, very low. And the ones that are suffering the most are tourism
00:23:31.700 operators, which haven't seen the return of American travelers in particular, who are coming
00:23:37.480 to Canada. And, you know, with these restrictions that are at the air border, it's getting more and
00:23:43.680 more difficult to attract Europeans and other travelers to come to Canada to spend their money.
00:23:48.060 Yeah. And lastly, Duncan, I just, everybody would agree that Minister Al-Gabra has been one of the
00:23:56.920 underperformers in the Trudeau government, and that's maybe putting it mildly. His instinct seems
00:24:02.940 to be to blame everyone else rather than own up to, you know, the government's failings. Do you see
00:24:09.800 any hope of real change in the sector while Minister Al-Gabra continues to be minister?
00:24:15.200 Look, I mean, I really can't say whether this minister is capable of change. The fact that
00:24:23.880 his initial reaction to the troubles at the airport was to blame travelers did not bode
00:24:29.860 well for the response subsequent to initially blaming the travelers. We've not seen any progress
00:24:35.400 since that time. And I wouldn't hold my breath in terms of any more progress going forward.
00:24:40.420 The only thing that is going to save the minister, in fact, from the mess at the airports is Labor
00:24:45.980 Day, because that's when travelers stop traveling. So, you know, it seems like he's just holding his
00:24:51.820 breath for another six weeks. And then, you know, things will miraculously get better when travelers
00:24:56.660 start going back to school and going back to work after the summer travel season.
00:25:00.660 Right. Well, thanks, Duncan. There's so much that we could chat about. But alas, we're getting towards
00:25:07.500 the end of our time. But I wanted to thank you for coming on the show. And I really hope that,
00:25:13.640 you know, we all have stress-free travel going ahead and that the chaos at the airports
00:25:19.140 is a temporary thing and that the new normal is not chaos going forward. But I really appreciate
00:25:25.560 your time. And I hope to have you back on the show sometime soon. Thanks so much, Rupa. That was
00:25:30.960 great. Thanks for having me. Thank you, Duncan. Thank you.