Good afternoon. Thank you very much for the opportunity to appear.
We are pleased to be able to have a discussion with the members of the committee.
My name is Allistair Elliott. I'm the international representative for Canada for the American Federation of Musicians for the United States and Canada. As a professional musician over the last 40 years, I've travelled most of the world performing music. My performing career has been paralleled with my work for the Canadian Federation of Musicians, initially as an executive board member, then as president of the Calgary Musicians' Association, Local 547, of the AFM, since 1999, and now as an international representative for Canada.
I'm joined today by oboist, teacher, and my friend, Francine Schutzman, who played in the National Arts Centre Orchestra for 38 years. She's the past-president of the Organization of Canadian Symphony Musicians, and currently the president of the Musicians Association of Ottawa-Gatineau, Local 180, of the AFM.
We are here today to enthusiastically applaud the Honourable Marc Garneau and Transport Canada for the inclusion of musical instruments as part of passenger rights in Bill C-49, an act to amend the Canada Transportation Act.
The Canadian Federation of Musicians is the Canadian national office of the American Federation of Musicians of the United States and Canada. We are comprised of 200 local offices across North America, collectively representing a membership of approximately 80,000 professional musicians, 17,000 of whom live and work in Canada. We've been representing the interests of musicians for 121 years.
As the distinctly Canadian division of AFM and under the federal Status of the Artist Act recognition, the CFM negotiates fair agreements and working conditions covering all musical services within Canada. Our goal is to pursue harmonization with the United States' FAA Modernization and Reform Act of 2012, regarding the carriage of musical instruments on commercial air carriers. We have included our original submission to the Canada Transportation Act review in January 2015.
I just want to thank the Honourable Lisa Raitt—I know she was in this morning and she's not in this afternoon, but her colleagues can pass it on—for encouraging us to enter that submission a few years ago.
Following extensive advocacy to all the key stakeholders, we were very pleased to be included in the discussions on passenger rights and are looking forward to working together to develop regulations once royal assent has been received.
We would also like to thank Air Canada for leading the way as an airline and working closely with the CFM to provide better service to musicians. This summer, at the 4th International Orchestra Conference in Montreal, Air Canada was presented with the Federation of International Musicians Airline of Choice award for 2017.
We thank Air Canada and offer our congratulations.
Musicians travel for business with oddly shaped briefcases. Players of smaller instruments generally have no issues with stowing their instruments on board. The problems arise with larger instruments. Cellos are the ones that have the most problems. Many instruments are made of wood, fragile, and affected greatly by temperature, which in itself, can damage an instrument beyond repair. Instruments belonging to professional musicians are often old and very expensive. Cellists flying with their instruments typically purchase a second seat for that instrument, but are nevertheless sometimes told they may not take the instrument on board. That equals lost job opportunities, lost work, and lost income. Some of you may be familiar with a song called United Breaks Guitars. This song was generated by an incident in which a guitarist, Dave Carroll, was forced to check his instrument, which arrived at its destination in pieces.
We applaud the steps that have already been taken to ease the problems of musicians travelling with instruments and we thank CATSA for working with us directly on some initiatives. There's still much work to be done. What we need is a well-advertised, industry-wide policy, so that musicians may plan accordingly for business travel with the tools of their trade and the confidence they will make the job interview or performance on time and without incident.
I'd like to conclude with comments made recently by one of our more high-profile member musicians, Dr. Buffy Sainte-Marie, on the floor of the Senate of Canada, when she was given special recognition for her contribution to Canadian music. During her remarks, she asked that the government help connect the dots so that musicians could travel with their instruments. She cited an example where she was charged overage fees of $1,376 for an underweight guitar and a suitcase.
Musicians have long had difficulties transporting the tools of their trade, which are often very expensive and irreplaceable. On behalf of all musicians across Canada, we thank you for this inclusion, we applaud your efforts, and we look forward to working closely with you to develop regulations that will be effective for everyone.
Thank you.