Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to our witnesses.
I'll follow the same line of questioning that Mr. Barsalou-Duval did.
The region I represent in northwest B.C. includes more than three airports with daily scheduled service, but these are small airports flying to Vancouver mostly. The region has seen a real lack of competition, and as a result, the cost of flying from northern B.C. to Vancouver can be as much as flying from Toronto to Europe. This is an issue that affects a lot of families. We lost the Greyhound service, and the passenger train isn't reliable enough to serve as regular transportation for a lot of people.
Many people approach me and ask me why the air service to the region is so expensive. Since the deregulation in the 1980s, competition was supposed to be a panacea for driving down prices, yet many of these markets are simply not large enough to support multiple carriers. We see what looks like price gouging to a lot of people, but essentially the airlines can charge whatever they think the market will bear. People have to travel. There are many non-optional reasons for travel.
Maybe I'll start with the question on the 1980s. They were a long time ago; we're talking 40 years. What did the regulations at that time look like, and how did they affect these more remote regional markets?