Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Minister, thanks for accepting the invitation.
We've heard a lot of testimony throughout the day. We've seen and heard first-hand stories of cancelled Christmases, delays, sleeping on airport floors and being shuffled from hotel lobby to hotel lobby in a foreign country.
Your government has been in power for seven years, and you have been Minister of Transport since the beginning of 2021. You oversaw the chaos this summer leading to Canadian airports being ranked the worst in the world—in both the number one and number two spots—and on November 17 you blamed airport staff shortages for the chaos during the summer and claimed to have solved the problem.
You had a summit, but, as we heard from witnesses today, provided no policy directives, per the airlines' testimony. Worse, passenger protections put in place by the government have failed to protect passengers, consumers or anyone in this country who was stuck elsewhere, or stuck on the tarmac for well over 12 hours in some cases. A Canadian who flies British Airways to the U.K. is better protected than one who flies WestJet to the U.K., and that remains a fact under these passenger protections.
Minister, you yourself are responsible and have the tools to fix it. The question is why you waited so long: why you waited from the first time you heard about Sunwing, presumably when the rest of the country did, on September 19; why you waited until January 5; and why you didn't speak to the airports, as we've heard, while Canadians were stranded again on tarmacs, in some cases in Vancouver for 12 hours.
I have a few questions.
The Canada Transportation Act permits cabinet, on your recommendation, orders to stabilize the national transportation system in an event of “extraordinary disruption”. We all agree that the Sunwing situation was an extraordinary disruption, and you didn't recommend to cabinet to make an order under section 47 in connection with Sunwing.
I ask, why not, and what was more important? What had you preoccupied?