Finance committee  The six small airports that I've identified, including Charlottetown, Fredericton, and Prince George, are in smaller communities and have lower traffic volumes. These are all airports that handle fewer than 600,000 passengers a year. Even when the national airports policy was being written, it was recognized that airports with these lower traffic volumes would face challenges paying for infrastructure.

Finance committee  Thank you. Mr. Chair, ladies and gentlemen of the committee, and colleagues on the panel, thank you for the opportunity to speak to you today on two areas of urgency to Canada's airports. One is infrastructure funding criteria for six small airports on federal land. The other is the provision of sufficient resources to support CATSA screening.

International Trade committee  Certainly, we understand that visa-related issues are one of the biggest concerns that China has. That's what I'm hearing from our members. We have a tremendous opportunity to grow traffic between China and Canada by taking advantage of that growth in air travel between China and other parts of the world.

International Trade committee  I think it's fair to say that most of our members generally believe that liberalization has been a good thing when you look at open skies agreements. For example, the United States has concluded quite a few around the world. Generally, they have opened up air services and benefited carriers from both sides.

International Trade committee  I don't know that I could add much to what my colleague in Calgary indicated. Certainly, air cargo is a more expensive way of shipping, so we see higher value goods go by air. We've seen a fair bit of growth; particularly as Canadian carriers have grown their international routes, that has come with added cargo capacity.

International Trade committee  Ladies and gentlemen of the committee, thank you for the opportunity to address you today on the subject of Canada's international air bilaterals. I understand you have already heard from Vancouver Airport Authority, which is one of our member airports. My comments will be presented on behalf of our broader membership, which includes 45 members operating more than 100 airports around the country, including all of Canada's major international gateways.

Finance committee  For the private aerodromes for which we understood this to be intended, it sounds like a reasonable rationale.

Finance committee  I assume, when you are referring to change, you're referring to the Edmonton International Airport. When our members make major infrastructure development decisions, there is a consultation process in the community, as well as with the users of the airports. Those are designed locally by the airport authority, and a lot of the parameters for it are set out in the ground leases between the airport authorities and the federal government.

Finance committee  Yes.

Finance committee  It's subject to being defined, I guess.

Finance committee  It certainly opens the door to repoliticizing it, yes.

Finance committee  We have. I'm familiar with their concerns. I haven't spoken with them this week, but we are aware that they have issues with this as well.

Finance committee  Our organization was part of that. It was someone on my staff who participated back in February. I understand it included a discussion about some of the examples that were of concern to the department. My understanding of the focus group was that it was about the perceived problems, as opposed to perhaps the language that was going to be proposed to address those problems.

Finance committee  Our understanding is that is the focus of the department's exercise in this area.

Finance committee  The language is pretty broad.