Who’s to blame for Canada’s holiday travel nightmares?

CLIP You’re listening to a frequency podcast network production in association with City News.

Jordan Heath-Rawlings This is a big country and a cold one. And the holidays are a time when we tend to realize both of those things. Some of us do it by navigating hundreds of miles of domestic travel between between us and our family gatherings. Others do it by making it a time to get out of the cold entirely for a brief respite before the real teeth of winter start to bite. This past holiday, no matter which one of those you chose, you were screwed.

CLIP Via Rail says extreme weather conditions have led to various cancellations for the day.

CLIP Another headache for Via after trains were stranded for hours on that corridor Friday night.

CLIP It was terrible. It says that we were on there for twelve I think we were on there for about 17 to 18 hours.

CLIP Hundreds of Canadians are still stranded in Mexico after their Sunwing flights were canceled last week.

CLIP Weary holiday travelers are also airing their grievances tonight at Pearson International Airport. A long list of complaints from people who have waited hours or even days to collect their luggage.

CLIP My grandkids presents are in my suitcase. Christmas came and they had no presents over the holidays.

Jordan Heath-Rawlings Canadians were stranded in Mexico. They were bunched by the hundreds of thousands into airports, desperate for updates on flights that weren’t happening or luggage that was somewhere else. They were on hold for hours with customer service reps and then they weren’t. They were desperate for hotels in the middle of the night or else they spent the middle of their nights on a train stopped in the tracks in the middle of nowhere, hoping for maybe some food or a working washroom. This was not the finest hour for Canada’s transportation network. On the land or in the air. So what the heck went wrong? Could we not have seen this coming? After a summer that featured endless reports of insufficient staff and resources and when things did start to go off the rails, who took responsibility? The companies? The politicians? Anyone? And what’s being done now? Anything? I’m Jordan Heath Rawlings. This is the big story. Stephanie Taylor is a Parliament Hill reporter for Canadian Press. She has been covering this whole mess from Ottawa. Hey Stephanie.

Stephanie Taylor Hi.

Jordan This is a delicate question. How did the holidays go for Canada’s transportation system in general?

Stephanie Taylor I describe it that there was an actual winter storm that hit at a very stormy time for particularly air travel. But we also saw with train travel in this country.

Jordan Can you tell me exactly kind of what happened and how so many things ground to a halt? I realize that’s a big question.

Stephanie Taylor I think we need to rewind back into the summer because as I said, there was an actual winter storm that hit right in the lead up to Christmas. But the wider context is back in the summer we started hearing complaints particularly around air travel and airports, as this was really the first time in 2022 that Canadians were traveling again, not just domestically, but internationally. A lot of the COVID measures had been lifted, a lot of Canadians got vaccinated. And back in the summer, we started to hear these stories about labor shortages. People stuck on the tarmac, people waiting through long lines to get through security, people being confused because they saw that their flights were canceled or delayed and they weren’t getting communication and they weren’t sure what was going on. There was a lot of concerns voiced about the Toronto Pearson Airport. And even to go back further, there was also even concerns about lineups at Service Canada offices to get passports. So that in the summer was really the first taste Canada got as to what does a post pandemic airline service look like and what does a post pandemic airport look like in some of the country’s biggest cities? And in the summer, people went, this isn’t looking too good. And at the time, the government responded as to saying, we’re doing what we can, airports are doing what we can. There was some extra staffing made to passport offices and the like, but after the summer travel season, those complaints kind of went down, as people weren’t simply traveling as much. But then again, you have a bit of a perfect storm, if you will, where holiday travel season ramps up. Again, this is the first Christmas where there are no restrictions telling people to stay home or not to travel necessarily. So you have a bunch of people heading to Canada’s airports. At the same time you had a big winter storm that moved through the regions. And a lot of those concerns that we saw earlier in 2022, the labor shortages, the lack of staffing, the leading to lost baggage delays, cancellation, it was just exacerbated in a way that we have not seen before.

Jordan Can we quantify the holiday period in terms of disasters and travel in any way? Like, do we know how many stranded passengers, how many missed flights, all that kind of stuff? Or are we all kind of relying on social media, anecdotal, horror stories, et cetera?

Stephanie Taylor It’s hard to quantify, but it is the hundreds to thousands, because although Christmas and the holiday season are in the rear view mirror now, these problems, as they existed in mid to last year, their problems are still there. It’s not as if the labor shortages have improved at Canadian Canada’s airports and airlines, but I think one of the most emblematic images of the holiday season was one that was taken at the Toronto Pearson on Boxing Day, where one of the baggage terminals broke. And this is on top of the airport and airport staff dealing with the winter storm, which brought a whole host of cancellations through a whole host of airlines. And coming down the escalators, people just saw these sea of lost bags and unclaimed bags. And I think that really illustrates the context in which people were traveling over the holidays. And there are a variety of stories, but they all hinge on some of the same themes. What passengers were saying was bad or poor communication when their flights were canceled. Some of it has to do with if you were stranded in Mexico, say with Sunwing, people saying that they were having to pay out of pocket to get cabs from going airport to airport. If you were on a Via Rail train and you were stranded overnight, upwards of almost 20 hours, for some people, you were hearing stories that they didn’t have working bathrooms and that there was a lack of food and water and a communication of when they were going to actually even get to their destination.

Jordan There’s a whole bunch of them. And I want to get into the train stuff in particular. But first, maybe let’s talk about Sunwing, because that’s the one that’s made a ton of headlines as you mentioned, Canadians stranded at their destination. What exactly happened? What is Sunwing said about it, and what’s going to happen to them? Because I understand the government has gotten involved here.

Stephanie Taylor So in the days leading up to Christmas, sun Wing, which is a destination airline for listeners who might not know that or haven’t flown with them, but in the days leading up to Christmas, hundreds of Canadians ended up being stranded in Mexico, specifically Cancun, because they said the airlines canceled their flights. And the airlines said they canceled flights leading up to those days because Canada was being pounded by a winter storm. But passengers in Mexico described not only being stranded, but having bad to no communication. Some of them described this scenario where they were watching their flights get pushback and push back and then outright canceled. Some said they couldn’t get through to staff. Some said they were being shuffled from hotel to hotel room. Sometimes the hotel rooms didn’t know that they were even going to be staying there. Some ended up sleeping up on the floor. Canadians had no idea when they were able to go and get back home. Some said that they were paying out of pocket while they were stuck in Mexico. The airline, meanwhile, they said again that these cancellations were because of the winter storm and that as of January 3, all of those stranded passengers, the recovery flights that had been sent to get them, they had been completed. But, and there’s a big but here, right after Christmas in late December, Sunwing put out a statement saying, if you are traveling in and out of Regina or Saskatoon from now until the beginning of February, your flights are canceled. And the fact that it went beyond the holidays and beyond a storm really had a lot of people scratching their heads as to what is going on here now. Sunwing said this was because of extenuating circumstances. And they described the cancellations in January and February to these vacation destinations from being unable to bring in temporary foreign pilots who they rely on to supplement the seasonal travel demand. For those people who’ve never been to the Saskatchewan in the winter, it’s very cold, particularly in January and February. There are a lot of people who head for hot vacation destinations. There’s a lot of people who plan weddings. There’s a lot of people who plan family gatherings. So the fact that the airline decided to cancel flights beyond the holiday season has a lot of people wondering what is going on here? And this is where questions for the federal government begin to ramp up. Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe and the government has said that they expect Omar Alghabra, Canada’s Transportation Minister, to hold Sunwing Airlines accountable for this decision and to try and find ways that passengers in that province are able to get to their destinations. We’ve seen that the Liberal MP who’s the chair of the Federal Transport Committee says, listen, I want to have a meeting, ideally before parliament resumes at the end of January and bring representatives of Sunwing Airlines to committee and ask them to explain what exactly happened here. The NDP and the Conservatives have also voiced that they need that meeting to happen sooner rather than later, but they want to have the Federal Transportation Minister show up and answer some questions as to not just how were you going to hold airlines accountable, but what did the federal government do while what they describe as this crisis was going on. Particularly when a lot of the issues that airlines are dealing with shortages, lack of staffing, delays, when it comes to baggage being stuck on tarmacs, these issues were flagged back in the summer.

Jordan While people were stranded and while sort of this was going on, because it took more than a week for some of them, right? And you mentioned it was only on January 3 that it was reported that they all came home. Do we know what the government was doing? And I know because we’ve covered it on this podcast before. This seems like a place where they need to get involved and there is a passenger Bill of Rights brought into place by this government.

Stephanie Taylor And this is where the questions and the fingers are starting to be pointed at the federal government because we did not see a press conference from the Transport Minister, Omar Alghabra. He tweeted that well, he said he understood that a Canadian snowstorm and airline has to make sure that when they bring passengers up in the sky, it is safe to do so. But he did call these delays and cancellations on the part of Sunwing unacceptable. But this is where the government is facing a lot of scrutiny, particularly from the opposition parties. Pierre Poilievre, at an end of year news conference, said that the government needs to bring in tougher and clearer rules for airlines in order to hold them accountable. And he said that the government needs to do more to clear the 30,000 complaint backlog that the Canadian Transportation Agency, the regulator for airlines, is currently experiencing. Because, and there are concerns that even if a frustrated passenger were to file a complaint and under law, they are entitled to compensation, what is the wait time for that to happen? So there is a lot of questions growing for the government. Not just from opposition parties, but I would say from Canadians more broadly. Because at this point, air travel has almost become a kitchen table topic where if you personally don’t have a story of a bit of a nightmarish travel situation, either on the part of an airline or at an airport. You know, somebody who does or you’re seeing the headlines and you’re worried about that vacation that’s coming up or that trip that you’re planning.

Jordan I’m going to ask a question on behalf of myself, but also on behalf of a lot of Canadians. We have a typical Sunwing going south for a week vacation planned in February. We don’t live in Regina or any of the affected areas, but just has the government or has Sunwing communicated what’s going to happen next or what people should plan for or how they can try to make sure that they’re doing what they need to do to try to get to their destination?

Stephanie Taylor The answer to that is going to be a no.

Jordan Oh good.

Stephanie Taylor I have not seen communication from the federal government or from the airline more broadly as to what passengers can expect, except for those in Saskatchewan who Sunwing has told you will not be flying with us up until the beginning of February because we have no flights for you. But I go back to this is why there is a frustration building among Canadians. And I think an interesting question is who is that frustration being directed at? Is it being directed at the big companies? We’re focusing a lot on Sunwing, but there’s also frustration Canadian passengers had at Air Canada, at WestJet, at Flair, at airport authorities who operated the airports, which may or may not have lost their baggage. So there is this growing frustration, I think, after the holiday travel season and a big open question of what are we going to do to fix this problem? What are we going to do to avoid another holiday travel situation where bags are lost for days and days on end and Canadians are not getting communicated with as to what is actually happening when a flight is getting delayed? And so I think this is why you have MPs on the Federal Transport Committee saying, listen, we need to not only get Sunwing and Via Rail and perhaps other CEOs and other representatives from the travel industry in this country testifying, but we need to hear directly from the Federal Transport Minister as to how did this happen and what steps is the government going to take to remedy this.

Jordan As you mentioned, off the top, it’s been months now that air travel has been incredibly unreliable. We’ve all heard the stories out of Pearson and other places. So whether or not this was acceptable, there is a level of kind of general knowledge about, like, airlines are kind of risky right now. Let’s talk about Via and what happened over the period right around Christmas. Can you describe just what exactly happened?

Stephanie Taylor For those who don’t live in and around Toronto, Montreal, Quebec City, these trains are very popular. Many people take them, particularly when they’re going home for the holidays. And so what you saw is, again, a perfect storm that happened in the skies, but it happened on the ground, is that we saw hundreds of passengers stranded actually on trains as they were trying to make it home for Christmas Day between places like Ottawa and Toronto. Some said that they were stranded for upwards of 20 hours. Some passengers reported not being able to access the bathrooms, not knowing when they were going to be able to get to their destination. Via Rail said that the delays around Christmas, they attributed them to the winter storm, said that there were down trees, trees that had fallen on power lines, that there were safety concerns. There was also the case that a CN train, because trains in this country share the same tracks, that because of a CN train derailment, all trips between Toronto, Ottawa, Toronto, and Montreal scheduled for Christmas Day were going to be canceled. And then on Christmas Day, Via Rail announced that those train routes were still not going to be running on Boxing Day. And so, finally, things were up and running on December 27. But this was a major travel disruption for anyone who is trying to reliably travel in and around these hubs. And this was another situation where the Federal Transportation Minister said in a tweet, and I’m paraphrasing, but said essentially, listen, Canadians understand a storm, Canadians understand safety, but delays and cancellations of this magnitude are unacceptable.

Jordan Okay, so my next question is, who is he talking to there? Because Sunwing is a private company. I understand there are government regulations, but that’s between the two of them. Via is a Crown corporation. So is he telling himself that this is unacceptable?

Stephanie Taylor That’s an interesting question, and I think it will be very interesting to see what kind of questions Via Rail might get if the Federal Transport Committee goes ahead and has a bit of an emergency meeting. Via Rail, in a statement, has told me that they will respond favourably to talking to MPs about what exactly happened over the holiday travel season. And so that’s going to be a chance for parliamentarians to really drill down into this. But you bring up an interesting point, and train travel in this country is one that Canadians, that some Canadians for years have said it’s not what it should be. They look to other places, like Europe for example, where I don’t want to compare apples and oranges, but some Canadians say, hey, why don’t we have something like this? Why can’t train travel be more of a reliable way to get around this country? And so this holiday travel mess that we saw both in the air and even on trains is really kind of opening up those questions again. And so, depends where MPs take their line of questioning because some say, hey, listen, is it a matter of that Via Rail may need more funding? Some may say, is it an appropriate use of government money given how many people may or may not use those trains on a daily basis? So these bigger questions about train travel and air travel in this country have kind of been blown open in some ways because of what we’ve seen at our airports and travel generally.

Jordan I did want to ask you, and you’ve touched on it a couple of times, but how is all this impacting the standing of our transport minister? Is he in danger of losing his cabinet spot? It certainly seems, aside from maybe Sunwing and people who work there, it certainly seems that’s where a lot of the anger is being directed. And I wonder if you’re hearing anything on the Hill about if somebody’s going to pay the price for this, I guess?

Stephanie Taylor MPs are not going to be back on the Hill working in their offices really until the end of January. And so right now these travel woes are dominating the headlines and as I said, they’ve become this kitchen table issue where it seems like every Canadian has a story or knows somebody who has a story. So the pressure is absolutely there. I think the question I have is where are Canadians directing this pressure? Are they directing it at the federal government and say, listen, we have a passenger Bill of Rights, but what good is that if there’s a 30,000 complaint backlog and it’s going to take me months to get a sense of compensation? Or a Canadian saying, listen, I want to know what’s going on inside the offices of Sunwing or WestJet or Air Canada or these companies that are providing air services. I know in the Prairies in particular, this remains a very live issue, particularly in terms of the fact that air travel is a bit of a utility. Air Canada announced that they’re discontinuing flights from Saskatoon, Regina into Calgary after already saying that they were cutting flights from Yellowknife to Edmonton. There are people in regions of this country saying, listen, I understand the pandemic was hard, but we need to get from point A to point B in this country. And it’s a big country and there’s only so many areas that you can do that. And so I think it is going to be interesting to see if the federal government tries to take more of a proactive versus a reactive response to this and whether they come out with any kind of an announcement of what they’re going to do with something like that backlog of complaints or whether they’re going to say listen, it is up to these private carriers or a crown corporation like Via Rail to explain their business operations to consumers.

Jordan You kind of just got to it. But this is my last question, which is the big picture of all this? And you mentioned flights being removed. We started covering this a few years ago when greyhound and other bus routes between small towns out on the Prairies just vanished. And I saw a map on social media a little while ago of what our train network used to look like between like small and medium sized towns. And it’s just not that anymore. The buses don’t go there now, flights are disappearing. Like at what point does this become a civic issue?

Stephanie Taylor I think an argument can be made that it is already a civic issue and to take an even bigger picture for a moment, we see divisions and regionalism in this country and there are times where that flares up more than others. And I would say right now is one of those times where it is flaring up. We talk about things like western alienation. Well, to step back for a second, how many Canadians have had a chance to travel all across this country? It’s expensive. It’s a huge country. And if you don’t have the means or you don’t have the times and suddenly you live in an area where your airport or one of the main airlines that you take is no longer offering service, what does that mean for you and how does it impact your life? So I think there would probably be Canadians right now who would argue and say, listen, our transportation system isn’t great. I understand this is a big country and it’s hard to get around in, but there is, I think, a level of frustration that is already there and I think from the holidays we just see that frustration flare up even larger. The question now becomes what does the private sector do about this and what is the role of government to be done and what can government do and what is government willing to do?

Jordan Personally, I would like them just to get it all figured out and back up to par by February 11. That would work well for me personally.

Stephanie Taylor Well, good luck with that.

Jordan Stephanie, thank you so much for this. I know it’s a complex issue. I understand it a lot better now.

Stephanie Taylor Thank you so much.

Jordan Stephanie Taylor reporting for the Canadian Press from Parliament Hill. That was the big story. For more from us, head to thebigstorypodcast.ca. If you have a travel nightmare story you want to share, send it to us. You know the usual ways. I’ll tell them to you in a minute, but we would love to make a little compilation of what happened over the holidays. You can find us by visiting us on Twitter @TheBigStoryFPN. You can write to us hello at thebigstorypodcast@rci.rogers.com [click here!]. Or you’re you can call us and scream out your frustrations into the phone line 416-935-5935. You can listen to this podcast absolutely anywhere that plays podcasts, and you can get it on your smart speaker by asking it to play the Big Story podcast. Thanks for listening.

I’m Jordan Heath-Rawlings. We’ll talk tomorrow.