Transport Committee on Sept. 20th, 2018

[Angelo Iacono, Liberal, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

It changes nothing, but there is still an increase.

[Martin Bolduc]

There is indeed an increase in trade.

[Angelo Iacono, Liberal, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

If there is an increase in trade, there is an increase in inspections. Are you prepared for that? Are you able to do it within an appropriate time frame? Given that new markets are opening up and that there will probably be others, are you ready for this?

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Can I get a short answer to a long question?

[Martin Bolduc]

Yes. The answer is yes.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Yes. Okay. Thank you very much.

Mr. Sikand is next.

[Gagan Sikand, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you for being here this morning.

I represent a riding in Mississauga, so I'm very close to the Pearson airport. Could you please discuss a bit of your footprint there, your operations there, to start?

[Martin Bolduc]

We have essentially two large operations at Pearson. In fact, our largest operation is the traveller operation. Pearson International Airport is by far the busiest airport in Canada.

As for the footprint at the airport, we have—not in the main terminal, a little further away—we have our commercial operation activities, which handle all cargo that is imported by aircraft into Canada. There is also a postal centre in the vicinity of Mississauga that, again, handles all international mail that's coming in.

In a nutshell, that's our footprint at Pearson.

[Gagan Sikand, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Our committee is going to start a study on the impact of noise and other things on adjacent communities around airports. I'm coming with that angle, but the ramifications of this do relate to trade corridors. I just want to share with my colleagues.

You mentioned there's a 25% increase in air passenger traffic throughout airports. I'm assuming a lot of that is in Pearson. How does the CBSA respond to that?

[Martin Bolduc]

To be able to manage the increased volume, we have introduced technology that gives an ability to process more people at once than we used to be able to in a traditional way whereby you would queue up and talk to an officer.

If you have travelled recently, you probably saw our kiosk technology. You go to a kiosk, you essentially complete your customs declaration, scan your passport, and out you go. You do a slight touch with an officer who will look at the sort of ticket you got from the kiosk to be able to confirm that the picture on the receipt is the individual in front of him.

That technology really helped the CBSA manage the increase in volumes. We were able to do that in partnership with airport authorities, which in fact invested in the technology. CBSA provided the specification, but each individual airport invested into the technology.

[Gagan Sikand, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Thank you.

I don't often like talking hypotheticals, but hypothetically if there were a Pickering airport, what would the CBSA's response be to another airport within the GTA with such high traffic coming in?

[Martin Bolduc]

Well then, we would probably get a request to have resources dedicated to a new airport. That would be assessed and a decision would be made. I know for a fact that at Pearson, the airport authority is very active in trying to attract airlines offering new destinations. We work in partnership with them to have an adequate human resource footprint to be able to respond to those.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

I'm sorry, Mr. Sikand, but your time is up. We're on a short time frame in this session. Sorry.

Go ahead, Mr. Jeneroux.

[Matt Jeneroux]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you for being here today, everybody.

Mr. Prasad or Mr. Bolduc—if I have it wrong, please just chime in—I think one of your slides speaks about the increase from 2012 to 2017 in air travel—commercial, postal, and courier. It doesn't indicate automobile traffic. Has automobile traffic across the borders also increased? I note that there is another slide that I don't think you got to, Mr. Prasad. It talks about the busiest commercial points of entry. I was just wondering if you could comment on that.

[Martin Bolduc]

Commercial trucks have increased at the land border. Vehicles have decreased slightly or have been sort of stable. We have noticed over the years that the traffic is very much influenced by the exchange rate. When the dollar was close to par, there was a lot more traffic.

[Matt Jeneroux]

Is the timeline on your slide the same, from 2012 to 2017?

[Martin Bolduc]

I would have to confirm. Unfortunately, I don't have....

[Matt Jeneroux]

It's recent.

[Martin Bolduc]

It is recent, the last fiscal year.

[Matt Jeneroux]

Okay, thank you.

The greatest commercial traffic is on the Windsor Ambassador Bridge again. Has that increased on the commercial truck side? Also, do you happen to know if the numbers of automobiles specific to that bridge have increased or decreased?

[Martin Bolduc]

If Madam Chair is in agreement, we can follow up and provide you with that specific information, which I don't have.

[Matt Jeneroux]

Do you know anecdotally whether it has increased or decreased? Are we seeing more traffic in general on that port of entry, or less traffic than what we would have had five years ago or 10 years ago?

[Martin Bolduc]

We see more commercial trucks. As for cars, I would have to get back to you. I don't have that information, unfortunately.

[Matt Jeneroux]

Okay. I would expect that to be some information that the department would be very knowledgeable on, only because we have a Windsor Ambassador Bridge that's now increasing in size plus an additional bridge also coming on board. Logic would tell me that it has increased significantly if there are 12 extra lanes—I believe that is the new number—to manage that.

I'm curious to how much it has increased. I kind of get the impression, with what you've alluded to, that the passenger traffic has actually decreased. If commercial traffic has gone up slightly, I guess that's good. It seems that we're building a heck of a lot more lanes for traffic that isn't necessarily going to be there.

[Martin Bolduc]

Again, I commit to providing the committee with more detailed statistics.

Do you want to talk on the infrastructure?