Passengers who say they’ve been mistreated by Canadian airlines had the national stage today as federal ministers, airline executives and accessibility advocates gathered for the first-ever Canadian Air Accessibility Summit.
“We can’t treat a wheelchair like luggage. It simply isn’t luggage. That is why we are here today,” said Transport Minister Pablo Rodriguez in his opening remarks on Thursday morning.
Rodriguez and Minister of Diversity, Inclusion and Persons with Disabilities Kamal Khera co-hosted the Ottawa summit.
“We know that the instances we do hear about only represent a small number of the instances that do occur,” Khera said. “We can, and we must, do better.”
In recent months, stories of passengers whose wheelchairs have been broken while flying, and passengers who were left behind or forced to deplane without assistance have made headlines.
The stories prompted a parliamentary committee to launch a study on accessibility in the airline industry, with executives brought before it.
Many of those stories were relayed again Thursday at the summit.
Lawyer and Paralympic athlete Josh Vander Vies told the audience about arriving at his destination without a functioning wheelchair or having equipment left behind. While he called on the airlines to do better at ensuring accessibility equipment is handled better, he also called on airline manufacturers and designers of accessibility equipment to modify their designs to better accommodate people with disabilities.
In 2019 the federal government passed the Accessible Canada Act with the aims of trying to make travel more accessible. In 2022, it took another step towards that goal by introducing the Accessible Transportation for Persons with Disabilities Regulations.
But accessibility advocates say that despite those changes regulators have largely refused to levy big enough fines to force the airlines to change how they treat passengers with disabilities.
The Chair of Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act Alliance David Lepofsky called the summit “smoke and mirrors.”
“The airlines know what would they need to do, the airports know what they need to do, the federal government knows what they need to do,” Lepofsky said. “Instead of doing it they’re holding a big, glitzy summit, so they can stand around talking about what they need to do rather than doing it.
Lepofsky, who is legally blind, said he dreads flying in Canada because of what he says are “inconsistent services”.
“I never know, when I land, how long it’s going to take me to get out of the airport, (and) whether or not I’m going to have someone to assist me who’s got any proper training on how to guide a blind person,” he said. “It’s basically organized or disorganized chaos.”
It’s an experience Robert Fenton knows well. As the chair of the CNIB Board of Directors Fenton, he is a frequent traveller and says he’s learned to expect delays or what he calls hiccups. He says that while he is optimistic progress is being made, he believes it will likely take years before passengers with accessibility needs can always expect a smooth flying experience.
The CNIB recently proposed 25 changes it believes would make for a smoother travel experience for people who are blind, deaf and blind or have low vision.
Representatives from both Air Canada and WestJet spoke at the summit, and committed to introducing new policies and measures to offer all passengers a smoother experience.
“The airlines are ready to step up to this and further regulations are not really needed,” said Westjet director of Regulatory Affairs and Accessibility Todd Peterson told the crowd.
The Transport Minister says he will be meeting with his European and American counterparts in the coming months to discuss accessibility in the air sector.
“I am pretty convinced we can accelerate some of the solutions,” Rodrigues said. “What I am ready to do is implement what you guys need because you guys know what you need way more than I do.”
The government says the event will focus on:
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discussing issues currently facing passengers with disabilities; -
working to identify potential solutions and action plans to address ongoing issues; and -
reporting on progress made since the coming into force of the Accessible Canada Act in 2019, and the Accessible Transportation for Persons with Disabilities Regulations in 2022.