Transport committee  The Parliament I am seeing is concerned about inadequate enforcement and inadequate legislation. There is, however, a difference. When it comes to the rights of passengers with disabilities, at least the government is showing some good intentions, whereas I could not say the same thing about passenger rights.

Transport committee  The explanation is that there is some intent of virtue signalling; there's some level of differential treatment based on political desires, as opposed to simply looking at violations and having a standard and consistent enforcement of a particular undesirable behaviour.

Transport committee  We were talking about the preliminary ruling on WestJet's challenge to a lawsuit about the one-person-one-fare rule. Passengers were suing because they had to pay extra on international flights in particular, because WestJet does not follow the one-person-one-fare rule for international flights.

Transport committee  Unfortunately, we don't have systemic statistics, so I would be a bit hesitant to paint them with a broad brush. Surely, the fact that they are trying to fight the one-person-one-fare rule on international itineraries is a concern. In another case I have been privy to, they took a passenger with disabilities to the Federal Court of Appeal in an attempt to overturn the Canadian Transportation Agency's decision, so they are being very combative in the cases I have seen when it comes to the rights of passengers with disabilities.

Transport committee  No, we should not be trend-followers; we should be trendsetters. Canada should be a world leader in accessibility in transportation. We should be setting the trend. We should be setting an example and letting other countries follow us. Just because the U.S. may be lagging behind on some of these issues is not a valid excuse for us to not do everything to meet our Canadian values of accessibility.

Transport committee  I'm afraid I didn't hear the legislation you were referring to. It was not in the translation.

Transport committee  Thank you. Now I understand the question. The airline organizations are setting norms and standards for the airlines. Parliament's role is to set the standards in law, so the airlines have to follow what Parliament is setting. Airlines should not be dictating to Canada what the laws on disabilities and accessibility should be.

Transport committee  When we look at the United States, it's different because there are statistics, and the public reporting of statistics. You can go on the DOT website, and find daily and monthly statistics on lost or damaged mobility aids. What the airline has done doesn't remain a secret. We should implement a similar system in Canada.

Transport committee  In my view, it is immaterial where the incident is taking place as long as it is travel to and from Canada. Air travel does not have jurisdictional borders in the usual sense. A flight starts in Canada and ends somewhere else. The fact is that these are carriers that are licensed to operate to and from Canada, and as a condition of their licences, they have to comply with Canadian law, including Canadian human rights legislation.

Transport committee  I agree that mobility aids are extensions of the body of the person with a disability. That's a very important message that, unfortunately, is not sufficiently passed on to those staff members who handle those mobility aids. There's no foolproof solution. Right now, aircraft are not necessarily equipped to transport those mobility aids in the cabin, which would be perhaps the perfect solution, although it may be an aspiration to move in that direction in the coming years in terms of engineering and what may be safe and possible.

Transport committee  It's “Lu-catch”, like you catch a ball.

Transport committee  Mr. Chair, honourable members, Air Passenger Rights is Canada's independent non-profit organization of volunteers devoted to empowering travellers. We speak for passengers whom we help daily in their struggle to enforce their rights. We take no government or business funding, and we have no business interest in the travel industry.

Finance committee  Thank you for the question. Clause 466 is correct. It increases the amount of maximum penalty. That's something we recommended recently. Also in clause 465, proposed subparagraph 86.11(1)(b)(iii) corrects a drafting error with respect to baggage delay. We had actually flagged it for the government in 2017 or 2018.

Finance committee  Yes, it is salvageable. It would take some work, and we have outlined in our brief the seven points of the amendments. The first is that proposed sections 85.09 and 85.14 would need to be deleted, as well as clause 462. In clause 459, in proposed subsection 85.06(1), the word “information” should be replaced with “evidence”.

Finance committee  The arguments are misleading, because this is not mediation. When you look at the process at proposed subsection 85.06(1), the end result is a legally binding order, just like in a court or in any tribunal that issues a regular binding decision. Mediation is, of course, confidential.