Mr. Chair and all honourable members, on behalf of the Canadian Air Traffic Control Association, I truly appreciate the opportunity to appear before your committee.
CATCA is a Unifor local trade union representing all air traffic controllers in Canada. It conducts collective bargaining with Transport Canada, Serco and Nav Canada on behalf of more than 1,800 members. Aviation safety and ensuring responsible working conditions for our members is our number one mission.
Before the pandemic hit, our members were responsible for the safety of three million flights per year. Air traffic controllers were short-staffed by 13% and Nav Canada's overtime bill was $100 million. We had 200 trainees in our system, and Transport Canada had ordered Nav Canada to overhaul its fatigue management system, as the minister had recognized safety was being compromised.
Since the pandemic hit, we've been working 50% fewer airplanes. By June 2021, we could be more than 20% short-staffed, and Nav Canada has terminated almost every trainee in our system. We understand that Nav Canada has seen a precipitous drop in their revenue due to the pandemic and needs to find efficiencies, but this cannot come at the cost of safety for air transportation. While Nav Canada is technically a private entity, it is in a unique position in that it is the only civil air navigation service provider in Canada. Their monopoly status allows them to raise fees, utilize government programs and, of course, petition the government for additional financial support to ultimately promote a sector recovery.
As you will have seen in the media, our union has raised grave concerns over Nav Canada issuing layoff notices to more than 100 air traffic controllers. This includes a level-of-service review of air traffic control towers at seven cities, as well as four area control centres. The Gander area control centre has been the hardest hit. Services provided in Gander are critical to Canada's historic role in providing air traffic control services to half of the North Atlantic Ocean airspace, which handles the busiest international oceanic airspace in the world, connecting Europe and North America. The potential layoffs in Gander will affect the North Atlantic as 40% of the more than 60 air traffic controllers who work the airspace have been served layoff notices.
During the level-of-service reviews for the seven affected towers, Nav Canada committed to a fair and transparent process and said the outcome would consider all stakeholders' concerns, review each situation on its own merits and ultimately produce a report in the spring of this year, should it wish to materially modify service at any of our towers. We've been further assured that there was no predetermined outcome as this process ran its course. Actions would only be taken if warranted, but not before the full process was concluded, including concurrence from the Minister of Transport on any proposed changes.
Unfortunately, all of the tower sites undergoing a review of air traffic control service have already issued letters to their employees that clearly state that they intend to close the respective air traffic control towers. It is not acceptable for Nav Canada to issue terms of reference on each engagement and yet have a different behind-the-scenes strategy when not facing hundreds of concerned stakeholders across the country, including what should be their most valuable source—their employees.
These letters confirm our early concerns that the outcome of these reviews was already decided before they began. Our association is calling on Transport Canada to discontinue the service review, due to Nav Canada's failure to act reasonably and in good faith. We are calling on the Minister of Transport to clarify their obligations under the Civil Air Navigation Services Commercialization Act on what it means when a party does not act reasonably and in good faith.
It is the opinion of CATCA that Nav Canada is moving with uncontrolled haste and has not been genuine or forthcoming with its motives. Every one of us understands that safety is being impacted. In addition, Nav Canada management received bonuses in December worth approximately $7 million and unionized members got layoff notices.