Transport Committee on March 19th, 2024

[Michael Rousseau]

The case you're referring to goes back to 2016, when Mr. Rose wanted to go to Cleveland, and we couldn't fit his wheelchair in the small plane we had at that time. We wanted to accommodate Mr. Rose. We actually worked with him to see if we could put him in a limo to another airport. We looked at another flight, and we looked at alternatives for him to get there with his wheelchair, so when the CTA came out with their ruling, we disagreed with it. It's nothing about Mr. Rose or about our commitment to getting customers with disabilities to their intended destinations. It's that we didn't agree with the CTA's ruling, so the only option we had was to go to court and appeal that ruling.

Again, you need to separate those two issues: our commitment to getting customers with disabilities to their intended—

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Thank you very much, Mr. Rousseau.

Next we have Mr. Bachrach.

Mr. Bachrach, the floor is yours. You have six minutes, please.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Rousseau, in your opening, you chose to cite the percentage of trips taken by people with disabilities that resulted in a complaint, and you cited the number of 0.15%. It makes it sound like a small problem and it seems to diminish the importance of the issue. I'm wondering why you made that choice in your opening remarks.

[Michael Rousseau]

We want to be transparent with the facts that we have—that was one of the purposes and one of the objectives of coming to the committee—to anyone we speak to about this very important situation.

I think that right after I presented the numbers, my next comment was that I am not diminishing this issue. We are spending time and effort, and investing, to get better. We know, despite the numbers I presented in my opening comments, that we need to get better.

Again, I've given this committee at least half a dozen significant process changes that we've put in place in the last six months and that will make it better. We'll continue to make process changes and invest in training especially, to ensure that we minimize, if not eliminate, the mistakes that are made.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

I am wondering, Mr. Rousseau, why you didn't start by saying, “We have a big, serious problem.”

How much money did Air Canada make in 2023?

[Michael Rousseau]

In 2023, we made roughly $2 billion.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

How much money did Air Canada invest specifically in improving the experience of people with disabilities?

[Michael Rousseau]

That's a fair question. I don't have that number—

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Does Ms. Wilson have that number, perhaps?

[Michael Rousseau]

No, we don't have the number. The reason for that is that, certainly, we have numbers where we've invested in equipment and we have a labour force that's dedicated to this to some degree, but there are also many other costs that are built into other costs, like technology and training, that we'd need to pull out to get a fair number.

I would estimate that if it's not in the tens of millions, it's certainly in the high millions of dollars of investments per year.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Do you track those investments?

You said earlier that you're investing significant resources. That statement must have been based on something.

[Michael Rousseau]

We're training 10,000 people a year now, recurrently. That is a significant investment, for one example.

We're buying new equipment—more Eagle lifts, for example—for more airports and for more redundancy. That's another investment we're making.

Beyond all that, there is a series of technology improvements that we're making as part of other overall programs. That is hard to pull out, but again—

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Rousseau, would you be willing to pull those numbers together and table them with the committee? I think it would be very edifying and useful for our study.

[Michael Rousseau]

I think that's a fair question. I'll take that back and see if our finance and other groups can pull together those numbers where it makes sense.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Thank you.

Later in this meeting, we're going to be hearing from two representatives of prominent disability advocacy organizations in Canada. Neither of them has been contacted to provide input on Air Canada's accessibility plan.

Would you be willing to meet with these individuals personally?

[Michael Rousseau]

Again, we've put together a committee of four well-respected disability groups: Barrier Free Canada, Brain Injury Canada, Spinal Cord Injury Canada, and Kéroul.

Certainly, we're willing to speak to other groups as well, whether it's me or Kerianne, who is obviously our leader in this area, as our director of accessibility. We would look forward to meeting with anyone, including your next two guests.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

That would be fabulous, Mr. Rousseau.

I had a chance to meet Mr. Lepofsky from the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act Alliance. I notice he's wearing the Order of Canada pin. We're also joined today by Heather Walkus from the Council of Canadians with Disabilities. I know both of them would very much like to meet with you and discuss your company's plans, so if you could arrange that, it would be much appreciated.

The last question for this round is around voluntary versus obligatory actions by airlines. We heard from WestJet at a previous meeting, and we've heard from Air Canada today, that there are voluntary actions that the airlines are taking. My question is whether that's enough to ensure a consistent experience for people travelling with disabilities.

Should we not consider strong national regulations that are properly enforced, so that there aren't laggards in the industry that aren't taking these voluntary actions like the ones you and WestJet have outlined?

[Michael Rousseau]

That's a difficult question for me to answer. Again, I'm looking at it from Air Canada's perspective. We're committed to this. You've heard about all the actions we're putting in place and our commitment to continue to improve. Hopefully, other airlines follow our lead; we're certainly willing to share our processes with them, as well.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Thank you very much, Mr. Rousseau.

Thank you, Mr. Bachrach.

We'll begin our second round of questioning with Mr. Muys.

Mr. Muys, the floor is yours; you have five minutes, please.

[Dan Muys, Conservative, Flamborough—Glanbrook, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

My question is for Mr. Rousseau.

Yesterday, Canada's Minister of Transport jumped to his feet and said, “I know, I know; we'll have a summit.” That has worked so well, of course, with auto thefts—which, as we heard from the police chief in Toronto today, are actually up again.

According to his own words, the minister conferred with a cabinet colleague and they said that there must be action now. They set a date of May 9—two months from now—for this action, which one can imagine will result in a report with a fancy cover and logo, perhaps on September 9, followed by the implementation of some recommendations, perhaps by March 9 of next year.

What would you see as the point of a summit? You've already talked about some of the actions you've taken; we've heard from WestJet about some of the actions they've taken. We can sit here and question whether that's enough, whether that's fast enough, whether you care enough or whether you are taking it seriously enough. However, what is the point of a summit two months from now to take immediate action, other than a photo op to make it look like the Liberals are doing something about a problem they should have dealt with years ago and are pretending to care about?

What are your comments about that? What is the value, other than a photo-op?

[Michael Rousseau]

I think there's value. There's always value in sharing information among participants, not just airlines but other modes of transportation as well. We can all learn from each other. Although I believe this important area has a very high awareness level and will continue to maintain that high awareness level, again, I think that sharing information, processes and lessons learned is always a positive thing.

[Dan Muys, Conservative, Flamborough—Glanbrook, ON]

Okay, so I guess in two months we'll share some information.

Ms. Wilson, it was referenced that you actually call and take feedback from those who have had negative customer experiences, and I imagine some actions are taken in response to some of those. Maybe there's an illustrative example that had a good outcome and you think would be a good one. Could you expand on that a bit just so we understand some of the processes and the steps?

[Kerianne Wilson]

It would be my pleasure.

If I hear about an incident, either through one of my airport colleagues or another colleague who's received an email and it gets sent to me, I take a first glance, and then I always have help figuring out what happened by getting feedback either from the airports involved or from someone on board the aircraft. I reach out either personally or through one of my senior colleagues in customer relations. We have a very dedicated team that works on accessibility.

The point of having those phone calls is really to understand directly from the customer what the impact of the incident was on them. Often, even though I've seen some of these incidents before, I learn something new that I've never heard.

For one example, I spoke with a customer who put it extremely succinctly. This is someone who uses a power mobility aid. Whenever they travel on vacation, their vacation doesn't start the same way it does for us, when we turn on an out-of-office message, for example. They are not on vacation until they arrive and they have been reunited with their power chair. The value of that small explanation of reality from a person with a disability often comes from my ability to then take those examples back and share them with all of my colleagues. It really changes how we view things.

[Dan Muys, Conservative, Flamborough—Glanbrook, ON]

Do you use any specific examples in the training, and do you give feedback to the Air Canada staff that have been involved in that situation?

[Kerianne Wilson]

I'll just repeat the question for the recording: What do I do with that feedback? What I will do is make sure that any staff involved are given that feedback. We often validate that this was the experience for the customer. It might not have seemed that way to you, but this is how they lived it. I will often look at the training curriculum and see whether there is something missing in the training. In some cases, as we spoke about earlier, it's a matter of the frequency of training or the way the training is delivered. Often, we'll see that the point in question was covered in training but perhaps not in a way that really resonated.