Human Resources Committee on June 20th, 2023

[Susie Fortier]

It's different organizations, so different groups. They had training in place for the people who were on the floor and for the managers of people who were on the floor because the service delivery is really organized with the third party screening contractor. It's the way the business is handled.

[Rosemarie Falk, Conservative, Battlefords—Lloydminster, SK]

Wonderful. Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Mrs. Falk.

Mr. Van Bynen, you have five minutes.

[Tony Van Bynen, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I appreciate the witnesses' coming forward and giving us some enlightened perspectives.

Last year, I optimized my own personal website for a wide range of impairments, including visual, auditory, motor and cognitive. The new accessibility options allow my website to be utilized by more people in my riding Newmarket—Aurora and by users across the country. In my opinion, websites have comprehensive accessibilities that should be universal features.

While the data suggests that website accessibility is an area that needs growth in the travel sector, can you point to any examples of progress with web-alternative formats for visually impaired travellers?

[Susie Fortier]

I'm not sure that we have the technical details to go there. We looked at the website of the entity. We did see that the website of the regulator, of the CTA, was faring quite well. As for the rest, we really just rely on the regulation as it stands with the criteria that were part of the regulation. We tested those on the existing website and found the deficiencies that can be addressed.

[Tony Van Bynen, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Thank you.

What I'm looking at is that it seems the role of government is to set goals and objectives. It seems the challenge is in implementation, in changing the culture and in gaining commitments.

When I was working with the bank, one of the rules of thumb we had was that there had to be at least three layers of management that were firmly committed to the new principles and processes. Was there any evidence of that being an embedded culture in any of the organizations you reviewed?

[Milan Duvnjak]

In general, as we were doing our audit, which took about 12 months, plus or minus, we did get a better understanding of the culture at the three organizations we audited.

It's hard to get concrete evidence, but we do believe—given the answers we got and the responses when we were clearing the audit—that the culture is changing. It is, of course, never fast enough. There is progress on that front in all three organizations we audited.

[Tony Van Bynen, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Through any of these third-party contracts or the people who are actually delivering them—that's where the problem is, at the delivery point—did you ever review any of the contracts of the arrangements to ensure that any incentive programs would reflect progress as far as implementing the accessibility act goes so people would be rewarded for doing the right thing?

[Milan Duvnjak]

We didn't look at that specifically. However, we did look at training, for example. We looked at training programs at Via and at CATSA, including the training programs that were used to train third party providers.

We did note that in most cases, the training was adequate. There were some deficiencies with the training. For example, with CATSA, we noted that one specific deficiency in terms of training involved how to handle a support person for somebody with accessibility issues. We also noted a couple of gaps in training for Via.

[Tony Van Bynen, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Do you feel there should be some reporting standards for the accessibility data, particularly with respect to accumulating the complaints we're receiving? Should that be one of the government's steps to make sure this advances at a better pace?

[Milan Duvnjak]

In terms of data, in our section, especially with respect to CTA, we talked about training. We discussed how it would be ideal if they had access to more of the data their counterparts in the U.S. have.

We found that CATSA and Via were managing complaints on a one-by-one basis. In our view, it's better to have a broader view. A better data strategy that involves a number of things would give them a better view of what's happening out there as opposed to taking care of it on a case-by-case basis. Seeing the broader picture would be good.

[Tony Van Bynen, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Consolidation makes things more visible and modifies programs.

Are there any organizations in the transportation portfolio that are doing good work in terms of training and providing physical assistance? Are there some best practices that should be shared amongst these organizations?

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Give a short answer, please.

[Susie Fortier]

We would have to say that the two Crown corporations, even if there were gaps, put some programs in place that were already developed, and they were continuing to develop them. Continuing to do what the regulations ask for and continuing to further improve and do the refresher is the way to continue to improve.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Mr. Van Bynen.

Ms. Chabot, you have the floor for two and a half minutes.

[Louise Chabot, Bloc, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Ms. Thomas, the Canadian Transportation Agency reports to the Minister of Transport. How did the minister react to the audit and to the report you submitted?

[Casey Thomas]

Most of our conversations were with managers and senior managers at the organizations. We don't audit the department itself. We had a briefing with the minister and I believe he was receptive to our recommendations. He was pleased with the audit and said he would implement our recommendations.

[Louise Chabot, Bloc, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

After seeing the challenges being faced by the agency in terms of preparing its reports, we can only hope that the minister responsible will get things moving.

In your opening address, you said that the agency couldn't have access to all the complaints. Do you have any recommendations about how agency access to this information could be improved?

[Casey Thomas]

The complaints to which it did not have access were those sent directly to the airlines. A regulatory change would be required for the agency to obtain access to these complaints.

[Louise Chabot, Bloc, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

That sounds rather daunting to me. Am I wrong?

I also read that complaints are sometimes categorized by type of complaint rather than in terms of whether it's a person with a disability who made it. That's not a criticism of your audit. Our committee's objective in this study is to learn how to strengthen the agency and the departments and how to obtain an accurate picture of the situation so that it can be rectified.

I agree with you, and I hope we'll be able to meet our objectives before 2040. I am accordingly trying to see what recommendations our committee might make to strengthen the data-gathering capacity, obtain more accurate data and give the agency the tools it needs to perform its role fully.

[Casey Thomas]

You're right about the complaints: they are categorized by type of complaint, and not by the status of those who made them. That, moreover, is why it's difficult to assess the available options for changes and for making decisions that would improve accessibility for persons with disabilities. I'm going to ask…

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Ms. Chabot and Ms. Thomas.

Ms. Zarrillo, is it you or Ms. Barron?

[Bonita Zarrillo, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Thank you very much.

It's me and then Ms. Barron will be taking up the next round of questioning for me.

I'll start by saying that it seems there is a message out of the Senate that the House of Commons' motion to the Senate about amendments to Bill C-22 has been adopted in the Senate. I guess it is on its way, Mr. Chair.

I wanted to speak a little about mechanisms to ensure that targets are met in regulatory requirements. It's mentioned here in the report that the target was 80% and that was 69% met. I'm wondering if there are fines or if there are sanctions.

What is the mechanism to ensure targets are met? What do we do if they aren't?

[Susie Fortier]

The regulator has a continuum of activities that they put in place to make sure there is compliance, from informative discussion and to issuing fines. During our audit, they were more at the early stage of their continuum in terms of what they did to ensure compliance. We did see that this was removing some of the barriers.

Since our audit was completed, we did see in the public information that's available from the agency that some fines were issued in other cases.

[Bonita Zarrillo, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Fines were issued.