It's fundamentally wrong. As other witnesses indicated earlier, regional air service is essential. In fact, it's what gives people in the regions access to service hubs, for example in health care or education, and so on. What's more, it's what brings the regions closer to the economic development and tourism the rest of the country enjoys. It's an essential service, and any essential service deserves at least some attention from the federal government.
In this case, regional air transportation, which is an essential service, is being used as a cash cow to fill government coffers, rather than supporting that sector. Passenger rail service gets $381 million a year in support. Via Rail is getting over $381 million a year from the federal government but zero dollars is invested in air transportation. On the contrary, some $400 million a year is taken from the carriers' coffers, through all the fees we mentioned earlier. That money goes into the government's consolidated revenue fund. So there's no benefit in terms of infrastructure or services to the public.
It's a paradigm shift away from rail service. We're not criticizing rail service. We understand that it's essential to support rail service, but trains don't go to every rural region in Canada. I can attest to that. Air service is so poor that I had to drive 13 hours to get here this morning.