Official Languages Committee on Nov. 19th, 2009

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

Bonjour à tous.

Welcome to meeting number 41. Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), this morning we are continuing our study of the broadcasting and services in French of the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Games.

It's a pleasure this morning to have with us Mr. Yves Duguay. Mr. Duguay is the senior vice-president of operations and official languages champion for the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority.

Mr. Duguay, thank you for being here. As you know, committee members have for some time been examining the question of linguistic duality and the Olympic Games. In the course of our meetings, we realized that the experience of passengers was part of the experience of tourists who will be going to the Olympic Games.

We thank you for agreeing to appear before our committee this morning. I see you have prepared an address in both official languages. I therefore invite you to make it to us.

[Yves Duguay, Senior Vice-President and Official Languages Champion, Operations, Canadian Air Transport Security Authority]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Good morning, everyone. My name is Yves Duguay. I am the Senior Vice-President of Operations at the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority and responsible for screening operations and performance management in our organization. I am also the Official Languages Champion for the organization, and I am a passionate advocate for ensuring that the spirit of the Official Languages Act is constantly reflected in our planning and decision-making processes. I am also responsible for our preparations for the Olympic Games.

Mr. Chairman, I want to thank you and the members of your committee for this opportunity to showcase how CATSA approaches the Official Languages Act and, in particular, how it will perform in the context of the forthcoming Vancouver 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Games.

Before I get into this specifically, I believe it is important that I provide you with some context about CATSA. CATSA is a crown corporation based in Ottawa with a national presence and mandate. We have approximately 500 employees in locations across the country. There are well over 6,000 screening officers working at 89 designated airports nationwide. CATSA's main objective is to protect the public by securing critical elements of the air transportation system. This is in our mandate. Essentially, we have four responsibilities: the pre-board screening of passengers and their carry-on baggage; hold baggage or checked baggage screening; non-passenger screening, which relates to the screening of airport employees; and the development of the restricted area identity card.

Pre-board screening is what most people, and certainly you, are familiar with. In a typical year, screening officers will screen nearly 50 million passengers. Hold baggage or checked baggage screening involves the screening of all checked baggage using specialized explosive detection equipment. Over 60 million pieces of checked baggage are screened at designated airports in Canada annually.

We also conduct non-passenger screening, which involves, in particular, flight crew, catering crews and maintenance and construction workers who have access to the restricted areas in our country's 28 major airports. CATSA administers the access program to these areas using a system of dual biometric restricted area identity cards. All these activities are critical to maintaining air transport security. It is a responsibility we take very seriously because lives and livelihoods are at stake, especially as the Olympic Games approach.

The spirit of the Official Languages Act is an undercurrent that permeates every aspect of the organization and is reflected in our policies and procedures and the way in which we conduct our business when it comes to large operational projects like the 2010 Winter Olympic Games in Vancouver.

Last month, as you are no doubt aware, the Commissioner of Official Languages addressed some 300 CATSA employees at a corporate retreat. He conveyed the notion that the employees of CATSA are Canada's goodwill ambassadors and that we are the first and last institution that many travellers will see when visiting Canada for the Winter Olympic Games.

The Olympic Games are a golden opportunity for us to showcase the quality of our people and services. We will use that opportunity to give Olympic visitors a proper reception in the Vancouver region and also at all other airports where we offer services, by serving them, in particular, in the official languages of their choice.

I want to emphasize to the committee that CATSA takes its role very seriously and to say that we fully embrace the Commissioner's sentiment wholeheartedly. CATSA's commitment to service excellence is unwavering.

Mr. Chairman, I would like to share with the members of the standing committee some of the solutions that CATSA has implemented already and how we are addressing the commissioner's recommendations, especially for the Olympics.

CATSA is committed to serving passengers in the official language of their choice and is regularly reviewing the procedures and tools in place, implementing oversight mechanisms, and taking the corrective action required to continue to make enhancements in this area. In fact, CATSA has already put in place several programs that help us to meet our official language requirements.

The following initiatives contribute to improving customer service monitoring, including official language requirements.

We have an operational performance oversight program. In the last two years, we've hired 100 oversight officers. These officers are positioned at screening points throughout Canada. They look at the work being performed by the screening officers to ensure that they are complying not only with security regulations but also with customer service. This is definitely one of the most important programs we have at CATSA. Official language is one of the elements being monitored by these oversight officers, which include the active offer, adequate signage, and the presence of bilingual officers at the screening point.

In the last two years, we've also implemented a shift briefing program, a direct communication tool with the screening officers that's published by CATSA and shared with the service contractor. This program provides a reliable tool to remind screening officers of our official language obligations. We did this in the last shift briefing on November 4, and we're going to issue a special edition of that shift briefing at the beginning of December. We want to engage the employees in the Olympic experience.

Ongoing compliance audits in major airports constitute another tool at our disposal. Our compliance team conducts compliance verification tours in major airports. In category one airports, which are our main eight airports, we conduct four verifications every day to ensure that the signage is appropriate and that staffing requirements are met. The compliance team reviews CATSA's compliance, including the official language requirements as per standard operating procedures and the Official Languages Act.

The performance payment program is a program with incentives for meeting official language requirements and for complying with both security and customer service standards.

In preparation for the 2010 Winter Games, we have decided to add to our regular programs and have been working very closely with our screening contractors to ensure that we have sufficient bilingual screening officers at major airports for this international event, more particularly in the Vancouver region.

For this purpose, 350 screening agents will be relocated from various places in Canada to the theatre of operations in Vancouver. Of those 350 officers, 50% are bilingual. This leads me to tell you that language proficiency was an important consideration in the selection process of screening officers for special assignments, particularly for the Olympic Games.

CATSA has established the Olympic incentive program for screening contractors participating in the special assignments for the Olympic Games. This program also includes criteria for meeting official languages requirements.

Today I want to thank everyone on CATSA's Winter Games working group, which has been working constantly for the past 18 months to make official languages a priority. I also want to hail the major recruitment efforts of our screening contractors, and I'm happy to announce that we will indeed be in a position to offer bilingual service during all operational hours at every site designated throughout the period of the games, not only in the locations where we have to offer those services, that is at 38 airports, but also at all temporary sites. Not only will we meet requirements in the Vancouver region, we will go further.

In addition to our participation in the awareness campaign of the Commissioner of Official Languages for Vancouver 2010, CATSA has also cooperated with various partners, including Air Canada, WestJet, local airport administrators, more particularly those in Toronto and Vancouver, and the Canada Border Services Agency, to pool our best practices in order to improve our official language policies and procedures during the 2010 Winter Games.

In closing, Mr. Chair and distinguished committee members, I would like to convey on behalf of CATSA that we are well on our way to meeting our official languages obligations and would very much like to ensure that the legacy of the Vancouver 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games is a memorable experience for all Canadian and international travellers, while continuing to ensure security at Canada's airports and providing excellent service in both official languages, while continuing to fulfill our security mandate to protect the public at large.

I am now prepared to answer your questions.

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

Thank you very much, Mr. Duguay.

Mr. Rodriguez, go ahead please.

[Pablo Rodriguez, Liberal, Honoré-Mercier, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Good morning, Mr. Duguay. You've read the report of the Commissioner of Official Languages that was tabled in 2008-2009. It states that, in 2007-2008, only 55% of employees occupying bilingual positions serving the public met the language requirements of the positions in question.

Has the situation changed since that time?

[Yves Duguay]

Are you talking about screening officers, contractors or CATSA employees?

[Pablo Rodriguez, Liberal, Honoré-Mercier, QC]

The report refers to employees occupying bilingual positions and serving the public.

[Yves Duguay]

I can tell you today—and I can always check to see whether there are any more recent statistics—that we have about 500 employees at CATSA. Nearly 50% of those positions are designated bilingual. Most are occupied by people whose language qualifications are already adequate. In certain cases, where the skills have not been acquired, a special training program has been set up. I can't tell you exactly what the percentage is or the number of those positions.

[Pablo Rodriguez, Liberal, Honoré-Mercier, QC]

Has that training program been implemented at the various service points in the country, at the various airports?

[Yves Duguay]

I was talking about CATSA employees, that is to say our own employees. As for service contractors, screening and control officers who work at the 89 airports, we have contractual obligations. They require the supplier to recruit bilingual officers and to ensure that there is always at least one bilingual screening officer at every control post in bilingual airports.

[Pablo Rodriguez, Liberal, Honoré-Mercier, QC]

The fact remains that the way for you to encourage suppliers to meet those bilingualism obligations is to offer them a bonus of approximately 20%. It was 5% in the past. Is that correct?

[Yves Duguay]

Our current incentive program has probably changed a lot from the one you are referring to. The purpose of this incentive program is to achieve compliance not only with the security aspect, that is to say the regulations and our normal operating procedures, but also with everything concerning the customer service aspect, including active offer.

[Pablo Rodriguez, Liberal, Honoré-Mercier, QC]

But these people receive a bonus if they meet their obligations.

[Yves Duguay]

Exactly, they receive a bonus if they meet the target.

[Pablo Rodriguez, Liberal, Honoré-Mercier, QC]

Yes, but they can very well not meet their language obligations and not receive the bonus. They do have the contract they've negotiated, and that suits them. Do you understand what I mean? There's no real constraint related to their original contract. They can therefore very well not meet the bilingualism obligations. Nothing changes for them. They simply don't get the bonus. They need only plan their budget in accordance with the original conditions.

[Yves Duguay]

I mentioned our Operations Performance Oversight Program, which concerns 100 oversight officers. Unfortunately, I can't go back to 2007 because the program wasn't in effect at that time. It has been in effect for almost 16 months. Between May and October 2009, the rate of compliance with active offer and bilingual services increased, as a national average, from 88% to 94%. That means that we are not perfect. It may happen that there is no active offer at some point at an airport. However, we're really trying, through our observations, to constantly improve our performance. Vancouver is the best example. In recent months, the compliance rate has risen from 79% to 94%. Although that's not perfect, there are contractual obligations—

[Pablo Rodriguez, Liberal, Honoré-Mercier, QC]

You're improving.

[Yves Duguay]

Exactly.

[Pablo Rodriguez, Liberal, Honoré-Mercier, QC]

In his report, the Commissioner says this: These observation results are unacceptable, and they are a clear indication that much work still needs to be done by CATSA to improve its performance in Toronto and Vancouver in time for the Games.

You say you're trying to take the necessary corrective action to correct this deficiency.

[Yves Duguay]

Perhaps I can draw a distinction. I don't know the sampling method used by the Commissioner of Official Languages, although we discussedth e subject on two occasions. I can tell you that our sampling comprises more than 20,000 samples and that the compliance rate in the context of that sampling was 94%, 95% in Toronto. With a total sampling of 100 samples over a period of six months, you don't get the same results. I'm very confident and very comfortable with the method we used to measure our compliance level.

[Pablo Rodriguez, Liberal, Honoré-Mercier, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

Thank you very much, Mr. Rodriguez.

Now we'll go to Mr. Nadeau.

[Richard Nadeau, Bloc, Gatineau, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Good morning, Mr. Duguay. I may be a little tough: I don't believe what you've said this morning. You should read the report of the Commissioner of Official Languages. I rely on him before I rely on CATSA, which is trying to justify the unjustifiable.

When you say that only 55% of people occupying bilingual positions are actually bilingual, I think that constitutes a major problem. We agree on that, beyond a shadow of a doubt.

You've received my complaint letter. I'm going to read you a paragraph from it:

On Friday, October 9, 2009, around 4:00 p.m., at Ottawa's Macdonald-Cartier Airport, I proceeded to the departure gate and went through security. The two employees present informed me that they did not speak French—We don't speak French—when I asked to be served in French. Both treated me in a condescending manner, immediately considering me as someone who no doubt wanted to assert himself and annoy them. Needless to say, I was not very pleased. I was furious, particularly since I had in front of me a little sign informing me that I could ask to be served in French. Neither employee even offered to go and find a French speaker to serve me. I felt like a second-class citizen.

Mr. Duguay, all that took place here at Ottawa Airport, in a supposedly much more bilingual area than other areas in Canada. We must agree on the fact that “bilingual” means French and English. One of the employees told me: “I do speak a lot of languages.” This was in Canada. In Ottawa, which is part of Canada, the official languages are French and English.

That said, how do you train your employees to show them what active offer is? Active offer isn't complicated; it amounts to saying “Bonjour, Hello.” In that way, people who arrive at the airport know they can be served in French or English and that, if the CATSA person who receives them can't answer them in the desired language, they will go find a bilingual colleague. That may take a minute or two, and that bilingual colleague will come and provide service in French or in English, as the case may be.

How do you provide training on active offer, if you do provide it?

Second, incidentally, I am very pleased that the Olympic Games are being held in Vancouver, but we'll go on living afterwards. I hope you won't stop providing your services or making your efforts at the end of February 2010.

How do you train your people with regard to active offer? How do you do that? I was personally faced with two individuals who quite stupidly told me: “We don't speak French.”

I'm listening.

[Yves Duguay]

First of all, I'd like to apologize if you didn't receive the appropriate services to which you were entitled and that you should receive. I apologize to you and to any other member of the committee who may have had a similar experience.

Unfortunately, of the 52 million passengers we deal with every year, there are occasions when normal operating procedures are not followed. That's unfortunate, but every case, whether it's a customer service case involving official languages or security, we conduct an investigation in an attempt to determine the cause and to solve the problem.

In this particular case, perhaps I can give you a little information, with your permission, about—

[Richard Nadeau, Bloc, Gatineau, QC]

I would like to say two things.

First, the fact that you're giving me that information is a good thing.

Second, how do you train employees with regard to active offer?

Go ahead.

[Yves Duguay]

You provided a very good description of our normal operating procedure, our NOP. Active offer does indeed begin with “Hello, Bonjour.”

If ever the person can't speak French... For the Olympics, we're currently developing a checklist with common phrases in French and English. As you mentioned, the employee should have gone and found a co-worker. Unfortunately, on that day, there were 10 bilingual individuals at the screening points and they did not take the time... An investigation was conducted, and I assure you that appropriate corrective measures will be taken.

Let's go back to the training aspect. There are two aspects that concern us in this matter: training and oversight. That's to ensure them that what we teach them in training is also applied in everyday activities.