Human Resources Committee on June 20th, 2023

[Casey Thomas]

Absolutely. We're in our planning stage right now for our future audits. There are definitely audits that are touching on this subject. They are on our list right now to determine which ones we're going to do in 2025 and further out.

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

I notice that in the actual user's experience with online technology, you used a standard from the World Wide Web Consortium. It was the web content accessibility guidelines 2.0. Is that an international standard?

[Susie Fortier]

Yes, that's an international standard. It's the standard that is required to be compliant with the accessible transportation for persons with disabilities regulations.

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Is that used all around the world?

[Susie Fortier]

It's used in many organizations. There is a new version. Sometimes Europe uses a variant of this standard, but it is under the same principle. It's the same approach. It's 2.0 versus 2.1. That's a very technical detail. I'm sorry.

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Did you look at other standards that were out there and just determine that this was the best one?

[Susie Fortier]

We picked this one, because this is the one that was required in the regulations.

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

It's in the Canadian regulations. I got it. Okay.

I also noticed that in some of the findings you actually used data from 2021 from Statistics Canada and applied it to a report in 2023. However, the technology is so different, and there are so many changes. How did you justify taking data from 2021, and applying it to 2023 and these organizations?

It says, for example, on page 9:

Using websites to make reservations or look for information was a barrier faced by 3 out of 10 travellers with disabilities, according to Statistics Canada’s Accessibility in Federal Sector Organizations Survey, 2021.

Is that a fair assessment to apply to this report two years later?

[Susie Fortier]

We used the data that was available. It was very relevant data for our purpose. It was for people who had travelled both before the pandemic and during the pandemic. The experience might have been different there as well.

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

For example, and this is 1.30, it states:

We found that 17%...of the online criteria tested at VIA Rail did not meet the required standards.

How did you find that out? Was it just by using that criteria and applying it?

[Susie Fortier]

Yes, we selected a sample of criteria. We looked at some selected pages on the sites of each Crown corporation. We used an expert in web accessibility to do the testing, as well as a person with a disability who did the testing on our behalf.

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Maybe I'm getting a bit too detailed, but did you find that the variants of programs used by the end-user sometimes varied so much that it was hard to really apply to that testing?

I was part of an organization that looked at digital literacy, for example. We found that it was really hard, because there are so many different types of programs. There are legacy programs that people have been using for 15 years, because they work so well. Sometimes, when different scripts change, it becomes more difficult.

Was there a way to get over that challenge?

[Susie Fortier]

We clearly did not have all of the tools and everything, but we looked at some of the top two tools that are used for screen readers, for example, in a variety of browsers, which seemed to be the more frequently used as a representation of this. However, we didn't test all of the tools that could be used. We used a selective approach on what could be tested to get those results.

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

When a report like this comes out and you have organizations like Via Rail, is there a follow-up meeting to figure out how they're going to move forward on some of these recommendations, specifically around accessing the online information?

[Casey Thomas]

Absolutely. Our process is that during the course of the audit we interact with them frequently. We share the draft recommendations with them to ensure that they're actually going to achieve the outcomes that we think the recommendations will achieve.

We then table the report and they're then responsible for putting together both responses to our recommendations within our report, but then also an action plan in relation to the public accounts committee hearing. They have put together their action plan and shared that with that committee.

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Thank you for the good work.

I know that my time is probably up. I can feel the chair looking at me.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Thank you so much for this work and I hope this is the start of an ongoing process to increase more accessibility for people in Canada, so thank you again.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Mr. Coteau.

Before we move to Ms. Gray, it looks like we'll have time for one full round, which is five, five, two and a half, and two and a half, if that's the wish of the committee.

Then it's five minutes for.... Is it Mr. Aitchison? My notes say Mrs. Gray, but if you do that, we'll not get to Mr. Aitchison.

[Tracy Gray, Conservative, Kelowna—Lake Country, BC]

Thank you. I know we moved a few things around there.

Thank you again for being here today.

One of the things I wanted to touch on was that the report revealed that Via Rail and the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority took steps towards engaging with persons with disabilities for specific activities when they should have consulted more broadly, such as on teaching methods for accessible training.

Based on your observations, was this a priority of those organizations?

[Soraya Martinez Ferrada, Liberal, Hochelaga, QC]

I have a point of order, Mr. Chair. I think you forgot the opposition here on the questions.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

No, I said five, five, two and a half and two and a half.

[Soraya Martinez Ferrada, Liberal, Hochelaga, QC]

You missed two and a half and two and a half after Michael.

[Wayne Long, Liberal, Saint John—Rothesay, NB]

Maybe we need the vice-chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

I'm following the approved routine, the approved order that we go through when we're moving through a sequence like this, which is subsequent rounds, because we did not go with two panels. We just had one. I'm following the approved procedure.