Transport Committee on June 3rd, 2014

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

It's one of the things that not only the public struggles with, but of course even members of the committee. We don't read your safety management systems. We know what components are supposed to be in it, but we don't know how each of you satisfies that. Obviously, they won't be identical safety management systems, other than the components themselves. There would be some flexibility in how companies achieve the objectives in their safety management systems.

I'm trying to drive at whether anybody can table a safety management system with the committee, such that we can actually read how each of the companies matches the components of a safety management system.

I'm taking that as no. Can nobody table one?

[Samuel Elfassy]

What I can tell you is that there's nothing confidential in our one publication that addresses the overarching principles of our safety management system. We refer to it as our safety management manual. The various parts of the organization use that to shape their unique features within the organization to address how they identify hazards, how they conduct risk assessments, and how they move on the corrective actions.

That publication is in fact submitted to our Transport Canada inspectors for review and approval, which makes it, in fact, a public document under access to information, so I would—

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Rather than going through ATIP, would you table it with the committee?

[Samuel Elfassy]

I would have no concern in tabling the publication so you can see an example.

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Okay.

I don't know if each of the member companies who are here today will be able to answer this, but how many inspections do you conduct of your own operations? How many audits do you conduct of both components and full system audits of your safety management systems?

[Capt Scott Wilson]

I'd be happy to take on that one.

It's ongoing. When you take a look at it, all of us have code-sharing agreements and we actually undergo ongoing audits by our code-share partners. We're all members of IOSA, the IATA operational safety audit. Every two years we have a complete audit done to international standards that include safety management systems.

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Is that a full system-wide look, or does that focus on components of your SMS?

[Capt Scott Wilson]

No. Basically the SMS is new, because most other carriers in the world weren't up to Canada's safety management standards. We've been the only airline that's actually been able to fulfill that for the past couple of years.

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Every two years your full safety management system is audited by an independent third party.

[Capt Scott Wilson]

That's correct, including flight operations, technical operations, cabin safety, cargo, the entire gamut.

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

For the committee's benefit, I would like each of the companies to come back with numbers on how many inspections you conduct, and how many audits you conduct. We'd like to see what the industry is doing.

On the flip-side, because Transport Canada is supposed to be in the business of oversight, and of course this committee wants to ensure that we keep Transport Canada accountable in its functions, I'm also going to ask if you can tell us how many inspections are done of your operations by Transport Canada, and how many audits are being done by Transport Canada on either components or full system audits. We'd like a sense of that, too. That would help us close the loop on what your interaction actually is with Transport Canada.

Are you willing to provide that? Or we'd like to see that in the next report.

[Capt Scott Wilson]

Yes.

[David Deveau]

Perhaps I could provide some clarification. When you speak of inspection, just for the members to understand, there are many layers of quality activity that happen within the carrier. We have everything from quality control, inspection activities rate at the practitioner level, whether that be maintenance, or even benders. We have quality assurance activities that are daily surveillance activities that happen within the business units. Then we have formal audit programs internally. Quite literally, depending on the layers, the degree of inspection you're talking about, this happens many hundreds of times a day. It's a very ubiquitous system. SMS is essentially a quality management system detailed for safety, so there's an enormous amount of activity that is weaved throughout pretty much everything that's done within the operation.

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Okay.

With respect to worker input, are workers at your individual companies involved in every facet of safety in a proactive way? Are they involved in helping the company determine its risk assessments of its operations, or changes in its operations? Are they surveyed for their perceptions on safety in the workplace? Are they involved in terms of determining what the remedial actions are for problems identified in your audits or inspections? How much integration do you have? How joint is the approach in health and safety within the safety management system at each of your companies?

[David Deveau]

I'll offer some opening comments on that.

Right from the foundations of SMS, employees were very involved in the development of policies and processes. Even once SMS was implemented, there are many layers in which we directly involve line employees. You mentioned risk assessments, which is a good example. When we are looking at changes to the organization, introducing something where there could be a potential hazard involved, we involve direct line employees in addition to SMEs and subject matter experts. That entire risk assessment process is to ensure that we properly identify where there could be hazards introduced in the workplace, and then work with folks who know the job in order to develop mitigations and solutions, which goes to your question about being involved in actually coming up with problem solving.

I should add, you used the term “health and safety”. Of course, you'd be familiar with the requirements for federally regulated industries under the labour code. There are also additional processes under our OSH programs to consult with employees as well.

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

Were you asking for information?

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Yes, it's tough in seven minutes to cover both question and answer to get into these in any amount of depth, but perhaps each of the member companies could detail where their workers are actually involved in that health and safety program.

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

We don't have time for that, Mr. Watson, but maybe through the course of the—

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Just table it with the committee, is what I was asking.

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

Okay, very good.

We now move to Mr. Braid, for seven minutes.

[Peter Braid, Conservative, Kitchener—Waterloo, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, gentlemen, for being here this morning and for participating in this study.

Mr. O'Rourke, I want to start with a couple of questions for you.

The National Airlines Council of Canada was formed in 2008, as I understand. Could you briefly describe why the council was formed?

[Marc-André O'Rourke]

Absolutely.

As you may know, there's another association of air carriers, the Air Transport Association of Canada. Our members were part of that association. In 2008, my understanding is that, given the nature of the operations of the members of the NACC, and given the nature of the membership of ATAC, because ATAC has many types of members—it has flight schools; it has smaller operators, which is great—it was felt that the interest of large carriers might be better served in a smaller association dedicated to the issues of large airlines. Given the nature of the business, it's very different to operate a flight school or a helicopter operation than major, what they call part 705, carriers.

[Peter Braid, Conservative, Kitchener—Waterloo, ON]

Okay, thank you.

In your opening remarks you describe that the process of ensuring safety with respect to our airline industry in Canada, the SMS process and system, is very much a partnership between the airlines in the country and the regulator, Transport Canada.

Could you elaborate on that statement? Could you describe if there are any areas for improvement with respect to that partnership?

[Marc-André O'Rourke]

Sure.

We believe it is a partnership, especially given the nature of the enhanced interaction with Transport Canada inspectors now. The SMS framework is not simply a compliance issue or kind of focusing narrowly, maybe, on a particular issue that was discovered. Under SMS, there's a lot more dialogue with the inspector. It's kind of a two-way conversation, so that's the partnership. It's not the simple compliance of coming in and checking; it's engaging into a more robust, more meaningful conversation.

What improvements can be made? Honestly, we would like to see the system be able to operate the way it's supposed to operate. The system has an inherent mechanism to always proactively identify potential hazards. If we just let the system do what it's supposed to do, I think we will see even better results.

[Peter Braid, Conservative, Kitchener—Waterloo, ON]

Very good.

As a committee member, whenever I participate in a study like this, I always find it helpful to understand how Canada compares internationally. Could each or any of you, all of you perhaps, comment on that with respect to airline safety in Canada and the regulatory framework and regime in Canada? How do we compare to other countries around the world?