Transport Committee on March 11th, 2010

[Gerard McDonald]

Maybe I can try to answer, Mr. Chair.

I had talked about whether we have enough staff, in answer to the previous question. As I said, given the 1,200 complaints that we receive each year, we feel that we do have an adequate number of staff to deal with those complaints.

When we talk about the 17 acceleration-related complaints that we received from Toyota, again, not all of those complaints, or not any of those complaints based on our investigation, could be related back to a sticky pedal.

It's also important to note that of the 17 acceleration complaints to Toyota, this was not particularly different from the number of acceleration complaints we would have received regarding the manufacturers of other vehicles in Canada. There was nothing within those complaints that would have given us rise to have any particular concern for Toyota vehicles.

I also would like to add that when we receive a complaint, it does not necessarily mean that there is a particular defect. That's what Trevor and his people try to determine when they get the complaint: what was the problem? When our people go to do the investigation, they may find that the acceleration issues could be as simple as human error, in many of those cases. In many cases, it's something else. It might be the floor mat, or it might be some other particular instance that took place.

So when they receive the complaint, it gets a general categorization under the term “acceleration-related”. It's then up to Trevor and his people to determine, when drilling down on the particular complaint, what is the actual problem related to that. If they can determine that, the file gets put in a dormant category. If not, we continue to do investigations. If we find there are some similarities in complaints, that then causes them to drill down further to find out whether there is something we should be pursuing.

That is exactly what happened in the case of the Venza. With the floor mat for the Venza, they found one. While one is not a recurring problem, when they found two, that gave them some rise for concern. That was the point when they started talking to Toyota.

[Roger Gaudet, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

Mr. McDonald, would it be possible to obtain copies of the transparencies from the meeting we had last Monday at Transport Canada? There were copies in French and in English, but there were none left when I arrived. Would it be possible to provide all the members of the committee with copies of the transparencies that you presented last Monday?

[Gerard McDonald]

Yes. We would be more than happy to share those with the committee. We'll make them available through the chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Thank you very much.

Before I go to Ms. Brown, I just have one question. Do you ever get complaints from dealers themselves on issues that they can't resolve, either through the company or...?

[Trevor Lehouillier]

The odd time we will get a technician who calls and says they've identified something, but to be quite honest, that is odd.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Okay.

You have a point of order, Mr. Volpe?

[Joe Volpe, Liberal, Eglinton—Lawrence, ON]

Yes.

With respect to the documents that are being circulated, are these the ones that Mr. McDonald made reference to in his introduction?

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Yes, they are.

[Joe Volpe, Liberal, Eglinton—Lawrence, ON]

This is the sum total of all the information he has on the Toyota file?

[Trevor Lehouillier]

These are copies of the public complaints from 2000 to February 28, 2010. Personal information has been sanitized from the files, of course. However, the make, the model, and the description of the complaint is there.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Mr. Masse, on the same point of order?

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Yes, thank you, Mr. Chair.

The minister yesterday mentioned that he would make all documents available. I would ask that the committee be provided with e-mails and other documents in the exchange between Toyota and the Department of Transport. The minister has promised that material would be available. As soon as possible, we would like those documents as well, please, for the committee's usage.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Ms. Brown.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

As the chair, you took a point of privilege and asked a question that I was going to ask.

I want to go back to talking about the complaints process that's available to Canadians. You said that the average number of complaints that you receive in a year is 1,200. So we're talking about three per day. I have a number of questions here, and I'll just lump them all together.

Do you do any determination on those complaints--i.e., whether they are perchance frivolous? And how do you define a frivolous complaint?

Do you track them by gender? Is there ever any discussion about footwear that may be used when these happen? I do a lot of driving and I wear high heels when I drive. Is that something that comes into the discussion, that footwear is looked at?

Do you track them by locale? Do more complaints come from urban areas or rural areas? Do they come from the east or the west?

Do you track them by weather? Is that another variable that goes into the process?

Do you track them by whether the car is a manual or a standard shift? Is that something that comes into this?

What responsibility is there on a mechanic? This is a question that I think the chair was asking. Do you get questions or do you get complaints from mechanics, from Midas or any of these other alternates to dealers who provide service? Do you get complaints coming in from them? Do they raise a point with Transport Canada?

Finally, you started to address this, Mr. McDonald, but I'm wondering what number of complaints would start to raise a red flag for Transport Canada that there is a problem out there if we're looking at three per day that are coming in on any variety of issues.

[Trevor Lehouillier]

With respect to frivolous complaints, yes, there are frivolous complaints, no question about it.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Could you tell us what number, out of the 1,200, you would consider frivolous? And how would you define it?

[Trevor Lehouillier]

Just to expand on the frivolous, often it's because there is a financial cost in having a vehicle repaired. When we provide you with the presentation that we gave on Monday, you'll see that there are typically four things that we look at.

We look at the fact that the issue ties back to manufacturing. If the issue is service-related--for example, you have your brakes serviced and your brakes fail--that doesn't fall under the mandate of Transport Canada. It falls under provincial regulation, servicing and licensing. Therefore, there will be a number of complaints that tie back to servicing.

There are also complaints in which safety is not a concern. Safety is the big thing for us.

We also look at what warning is provided to the operator. For example, a wheel bearing is making noise. Maybe the wheel bearing is defective, but it's making noise, giving you, the operator, some feedback that you need to do something. You need to take that vehicle and get it serviced. If you ignore that noise for six months and then the wheel falls off because of that, you do have a responsibility as an operator. That's something that we would consider during the process of our investigation.

So with frivolous, yes, there definitely are some complaints that are frivolous. We do not look at 1,200 vehicles a year. We look at a percentage of those. I can get back to you with more details on vehicle inspections and that type of idea, the exact number. I don't want to throw out a number only to lead you down the wrong road.

Dealers are not regulated by Transport Canada. They would fall under provincial regulation for the licensing of technicians. I am not aware of anything that would suggest that they have, besides ethically, a responsibility to bring something to Transport. I'm assuming they would bring that to their technical people. Manufacturers have these types of services. They have technical representatives, regional representation. If there are issues, they are being brought to the manufacturer through their dealer network in that sense.

I'm not sure if I've covered all of your questions.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Pretty much; you're getting there.

[Trevor Lehouillier]

Oh, yes; footwear and weather. Those types of things are definitely considered when we're looking at situations.

As an example, among the complaints that are going out, there is one complaint where the gentleman complains that the only time it happens is in the winter, when he has his winter boots on. You know, I don't think we necessarily have to hold a full-blown investigation to get an understanding of what might be taking place in that particular type of case.

So yes, we look at footwear, we look at weather, we look at regions. We do not necessarily document things and say, okay, we have five cases with women and five cases with men. We wouldn't go that specific. However, for these types of cases, footwear is definitely a consideration.

The floor mats that are used is a consideration always, to the point where we actually issued a safety advisory in 2007 with respect to floor mats. The reason was that we were seeing aftermarket floor mats. The federal government does not regulate aftermarket components. That's a provincial area. However, we were seeing where aftermarket floor mats were interacting with pedals. We took a proactive action to issue this advisory. It's on our website. It was issued in 2007, informing people how to properly install their floor mats because of the fact that we had seen it with aftermarket floor mats.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Ms. Crombie.

[Bonnie Crombie, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Mr. Chair, thank you for welcoming me to this committee. Obviously, I am new, and I'm new to these issues, other than as a consumer, but I am getting up to speed quickly.

I want to welcome the witnesses. Thank you for appearing before us today.

Mr. Lehouillier told us that he's just received the readers prototype only this week, and there was no technical expertise on this black box, so there is no technology to do the testing. I am very concerned that we have the adequate technology to protect consumers and ensure the safety of Canadians.

Mr. Lussier told us that they don't keep data that cause accidents that are attributed to defects.

Mr. McDonald, are these serious issues, and are these issues of concern to you?

[Gerard McDonald]

No. With respect to the black box, obviously this is new technology, and we were on Toyota right away as soon as we found out it was available. We are going to make use of it. We have now received it. We are going to test it and make sure we can use it as soon as possible.

With respect to the data, obviously the more data you have, the better decisions you can make. Unfortunately, we do have data on road accidents and the cause of their occurrence, but while we can obtain some information from the statistics we have, the cause of all accidents is not immediately known, nor can all safety defects be attributed to particular accidents. It's a matter of the granularity of the data.

[Bonnie Crombie, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Thank you.

Do you think you have the tools to properly conduct the investigations and ensure the safety and protection of Canadians?

[Gerard McDonald]

Yes, under the Motor Vehicle Safety Act, I do believe we have the tools.