:
First of all, let me thank the committee for this hearing and for my invitation.
[Translation]
I will make my presentation in English, but I can answer questions in French.
[English]
At least, I hope so.
I want to make two primary points about the current legislation before this committee. The first is that this act deals with two kinds of data and with the destinations of those data. The two kinds are API and PNR data. API is “advance passenger information”. That is the normal information that occurs on your passport: your name, your date of birth, your gender.
However, PNR information, which would also be required to be disclosed by airlines if this bill is passed, is much more far-reaching. PNR was originally a commercial system designed by the airlines to facilitate travel. It includes not only one's name and identification, but also fields for payment information, such as your credit card details; contact details, such as your phone number or home address; frequent flyer information; in some cases age, if the passenger is either young or elderly; special service requests, such as a meal request or a seating preference; special instructions; and blank fields that airlines and travel agents are able to fill in as they wish.
Governments want this information so that they can build profiles of not just risky passengers but safe passengers as well. Research clearly demonstrates that in the United States and the U.K., government agencies are trying to collect as much data about travellers as possible. Government agencies such as the UK Border Agency try to develop very sophisticated algorithms that predict not which individuals are dangerous, but what kinds of itineraries are dangerous.
For example, if there were a sudden death or illness of a Canadian citizen and a person rushed to the Ottawa airport and bought a ticket to Colombia, paid in cash, and had no baggage, that profile itself would be considered risky because of the reaction to the “underwear bomber” or to Richard Reid, who also arrived at the airport with no luggage for a long flight and paid in cash that day.
What worries me about this particular legislation is that the data not only go to the destination country but may go to all states that the airline might fly over. That, I feel, is the significant change that this legislation brings, and it worries me a great deal.
Flights that use the polar routes from Vancouver to Hong Kong would have to go over Russia and China. Are we suggesting that they are reasonable destinations for the passenger data of Canadian citizens? Flights that go to Colombia or Brazil must overfly any number of Latin American countries. Flights to Dubai must overfly most European countries and some Middle Eastern countries. Is the Government of Canada confident that the destination for their data can provide adequate protection? Are Air Canada and other air providers confident of that as well?
I understand that one of the reasons for this legislation is to get around the requirements of PIPEDA for Air Canada to provide such data. What worries me is that neither the government nor other agencies have put protection in place for data that will now go abroad.
I'm very heartened by the serious and complex debate in the House of Commons on this legislation, but while I don't want to contradict the parliamentary secretary to the Minister of Public Safety, it seems to me that on October 19 he refers to the ACLU's—the American Civil Liberties Union's—endorsement of the secure flight program. I assume from my own research that he is referring to a news release from 2005 that refers specifically to the change in the secure flight program in 2005 when they decided not to use commercial data services for the processing of PNR data. I would just like to point out that the ACLU has since changed its 2005 position and no longer endorses the secure flight program in the way that seemed to be implied on October 19.
The ACLU has argued, as I think we would all argue, that the no-fly list of the secure flight program in the United States is at best a very blunt instrument. There are more than one million names on the U.S. no-fly list, to the best of our knowledge. What the secure flight program does is automatically compare the names that are entered through API data against the multiple watch lists.
What concerns me is that PNR data adds a lot of extraneous data. It adds a great deal of cost, but provides us with no security benefit.
Let me make three points in conclusion.
First, I think it is dangerous to sacrifice our privacy and our freedoms for the dream of zero risk or perfect security. This particular measure does not provide additional security for the aviation sector, and it places an additional burden on Canadian citizens who are flying.
Second, Canada has set a high global standard for the use of PNR, in particular with the Canada-EU agreement relating to PNR matters. This agreement is praised by both Canadian and European data protection authorities because it has specific time periods for the disposal of data, it limits the data's use, and it limits in particular the individualization of that data. The information is rendered anonymous, which allows the security services to build up the profile without attaching it to any one individual. This has become one of the global standards for international treaties on PNR agreements, and we are moving away from that high standard with the passage of this legislation.
Third, the use of this commercial data, because it is created by airlines for their use, poses clear risks to privacy and no clear benefit. There is no reciprocity among any of the other countries. We are simply making Canadians more vulnerable to the security services of other nations, and we are doing so for countries that may not have the same robust privacy legislation or commitment that we have in Canada.
Canadians' data should not be hostage to the most paranoid regime that an air company chooses to fly over. The proposed change to these data protection regulations to include overflight states dramatically increases the vulnerability of Canadians' data while offering no means of redress or appeal.
We can assume that citizens know when they travel to a particular country that they are consenting. They know they go through a visa process and a border process, so they know their data is being evaluated. However, Canadians would have no way of knowing which of the countries they flew over would get their data, what would happen to their data, or how to appeal the use of that data. I think this is a dangerous change that poses clear costs but offers no benefit.
Again, thank you very much for the opportunity. I look forward to your questions.
I'd like to thank the committee for the invitation to appear before you today about Bill an act to amend the Aeronautics Act. I am joined today by Khalid Elgazzar, a member of the board of directors of the Canadian Council on American-Islamic Relations, or CAIR-CAN. CAIR-CAN is a national not-for-profit grassroots organization that continues to work, as it has for over 10 years now, to empower Canadian Muslims in the fields of human rights and civil liberties, education and outreach, and public advocacy.
Since the tragic events of 9/11, Canada has understandably placed a greater emphasis on public safety and national security. However, in some circumstances those measures were implemented at the expense of fundamental human and privacy rights.
For reasons we will explore, many Canadian Muslims have particular concerns regarding how the introduction of new security regimes seems to have had a disproportionate impact on members of our communities.
On its surface, Bill appears innocuous enough, consisting as it does of only two clauses with a single purpose: to permit airlines flying over a foreign country to share certain information with that country when required to do so by its laws, an act that is currently prohibited under Canadian privacy laws.
However, in our view Bill raises a number of serious concerns that we hope this committee and Parliament will address. Chief among these concerns is the potential impact that the secure flight program will have on Canada's sovereignty and on the protection of the privacy and human rights of its citizens. We've all seen from past cases how the lack of controls, caveats, or protections set on information shared with the United States has had disastrous consequences on the lives and livelihoods of Canadian citizens.
Finally, we are also concerned that the regime Bill would have airlines feed information into is one that lacks an adequate system of redress in the case of error or abuse.
With respect to the potential impact on sovereignty, Bill , as it is currently written, will effectively cede the right of Canada to determine who is or is not permitted to travel to and from this country. An internal Public Safety document obtained under the Access to Information Act and publicized in January of this year stated:
It is possible that Canadians overflying the United States could be denied boarding based on U.S. no-fly lists that were developed based on a lower U.S. risk tolerance.
In essence, many Canadians who wish or may be required to travel for personal, work, or emergency reasons will only be allowed to do so with the express permission of a foreign state, in this case the United States. U.S. government sovereignty, which extends over its airspace as indicated in international law, allows it to implement its secure flight program; however, the job of the Canadian government is or should be first and foremost to do its utmost to protect the rights of Canada's citizens.
With respect to the potential impact on privacy and human rights protection, aside from the issue of sovereignty, CAIR-CAN is concerned about the lack of consideration the existing legislation grants to the issues of privacy protection and potential human rights violations.
Under the Bill regime, airlines overflying American territory would be obliged to share personal data with the U.S. government, an act that is currently prohibited by PIPEDA. This comes without any guarantees regarding how or with whom the U.S. might, at its own discretion, choose to use or share that data. These concerns are shared by officials in Canada's own Public Safety department, as was discovered through an Access to Information Act request.
As we know from cases such as that of Maher Arar, the unfettered sharing of information without any safeguards or adequate redress mechanisms can have disastrous and irreversible consequences. Given the price paid by Canadians such as Mr. Arar, who have suffered as a result of the indiscriminate sharing of information with foreign governments, it is imperative that this Parliament do everything possible to mitigate potential mistreatment abroad by third countries, some of which, as we know, do not share Canada's respect for human rights and civil liberties to the same extent.
Finally, with respect to an adequate redress system, as the Department of Homeland Security's own privacy impact assessment suggests, information that is harvested can be disclosed and used for purposes other than aviation security--for example, for immigration or law enforcement purposes.
Significantly, not only will airlines be required to provide DHS with basic information—date of birth, name, and gender—but also with other “if available” information linked to passengers, including meal selection, passport, and itinerary information. This could potentially open the door to racial or religious profiling.
Experts in security fields have testified that religious and racial profiling simply does not work, nor does it our enhance security. Without any assurances or agreements in place to prevent this kind of abuse, it can create or enhance the very real sense of fear felt by potentially targeted communities, such as Arabs and Muslims.
The mandate of the International Civil Liberties Monitoring Group's clearinghouse project is to document the impacts of no-fly lists, including so-called false positives. It has noted that “Many of the travelers who have been delayed are members of Middle Eastern or Muslim communities”. Furthermore, the ineffectiveness of the DHS travel redress inquiry program, or TRIP, is acknowledged in a 2009 report by the U.S. DHS inspector general, who confirmed that in most cases the program has done little to improve the situation of those who have been the victims of false positives and misidentification.
The lack of a robust redress system within the watchlists upon which the secure flight rules will rely is illustrated today by the plight of citizens such as Adil Charkaoui and Abdullah Almalki. Deemed by Canadian courts or commissions of inquiry not to pose a risk to the national security of Canada, they still find themselves unable to fly as a result of being on U.S. watchlists.
In conclusion, Canadian Muslims remain unequivocally committed, like our fellow citizens, to finding the necessary balance between ensuring that the public safety and national security of our country and its allies is maintained while protecting Canada's sovereignty and the cherished privacy and human rights of her citizens.
Thank you for giving us the opportunity to comment on this legislation. We will be happy to take your questions.
[Translation]
My presentation will be in English, but you can ask me questions in French.
[English]
My name is Toby Lennox. I am vice-president of corporate affairs and communications for the Greater Toronto Airports Authority. I first would like to thank you very much for the opportunity to appear before you today to provide our perspective on Bill .
As many of you know, the GTAA is the private not-for-profit corporation that operates Canada's largest airport, Toronto Pearson International Airport. Toronto Pearson is truly a global gateway connecting our country with the rest of the world. We handle approximately one-third of Canada's air traffic in any year, and about 50% of all Canada's air cargo. This activity fuels Toronto Pearson's role as a critical economic engine for southern Ontario and, indeed, for Canada. We generate tens of thousands of jobs and billions in annual economic output, wages, and taxes.
In the past, Mr. Chairman, I have appeared before your committee on behalf of both Toronto Pearson and the Canadian airport community, and one consistent message that we have brought forward is that aviation security is critically important to our business. The security of North America's skies and the global air transportation system profoundly impacts the operations and financial health of Toronto Pearson, as well as all of Canada's economic and social interests. It is for this reason alone that we're presenting to you today.
While Canada's airports are not involved in the development or maintenance of no-fly lists and we do not gather, hold, or transmit the personal information identified in Bill , we do support both your consideration and passing of this proposed legislation. We believe this legislation is consistent with international law, which explicitly outlines the right of any country to regulate foreign carriers entering that country's airspace, but in addition to this, we recognize the importance of this bill for two reasons.
First, as you have heard from our Canadian airline customers, inaction would result in significant operational hardships for airlines, and by extension and perhaps more importantly, this impact would reduce the selection of routes, services, and access for Canadians.
Canada was built upon air and aviation links. A large number of flights that depart Toronto Pearson every day are required to overfly the United States. If this bill is not passed, air services that currently overfly American territory--for example, flights to South America and the Caribbean--would no longer be feasible. For Canadian-sourced flights, it is simply not commercially viable, or indeed operationally viable, in some cases, to fly around American airspace. The impact on Canadian air carriers' passengers and the resulting negative impact on the economy is a very compelling reason to support Bill .
The second reason for our support of this bill is that we believe it strengthens aviation security globally. As we have discussed with this committee before, Toronto Pearson believes that collectively we must find enhanced and efficient ways of identifying, assessing, and mitigating threats to security through holistic means. One of the key operational initiatives that we support is the enhancement of collaboration and intelligence-sharing. If we have learned anything from the cargo-bomb plot originating in Yemen and from the events of last December 25, it is that intelligence is one of our best defences against security threats. Bill provides one means for Canadian air carriers to work with our American neighbours to identify, detect, and deter terrorist threats.
When discussing aviation security, we believe it is important to frame the discussion not in terms of specific airports or even national terms, but in terms of the shared threats to our continent. We support the continued efforts of the Government of Canada and the United States to address common threats of terrorism while ensuring the free flow of travel and trade across the border.
Mr. Chairman, most will agree that the threat to aviation is real. We take this threat very seriously because we recognize that a security incident originating at our airport would likely result in crippling economic consequences. These consequences would surely extend beyond the borders of the Greater Toronto Area and would take years to remedy. We cannot afford to be reactive. We would like to ensure that security legislation and policies in Canada are developed from a proactive strategic perspective.
There are significant policy directions we feel the government should pursue to strengthen the effectiveness and coordination of aviation security, and Bill is at least a step in the right direction. We emphasize that this bill represents merely one step in a more comprehensive approach to aviation security.
We do acknowledge the privacy concerns raised by some with respect to the implementation of this amendment. In addition, we commend the committee for encouraging open debate on the merits of this bill.
We believe it is important to protect the civil rights of Canadians, and as such, we agree the information that is collected and disclosed to foreign governments should be handled carefully and only be used for the stated purpose of aviation security.
In conclusion, Toronto Pearson considers the safety and security of our passengers and air carriers to be of the highest priority. It is a key element in all we do, and we work diligently with our stakeholders to ensure Canada's aviation security program is holistic, integrated, and world class.
We encourage the committee to support Bill to ensure these very important amendments are enacted to support global efforts to combat terrorist threats to the North American aviation system. The bill will allow air carriers to continue to operate over U.S. airspace, which is critical to their operations as well as to the economic development potential for the Greater Toronto Area and for Canada as a whole.
I would be pleased to answer any questions the committee may have, both at this session and at any member's convenience.
Thank you.
:
Good morning and thank you. Please excuse me, my French is very limited.
[English]
I'm sorry I can't be with you in Ottawa, but I'm very grateful for the opportunity to contribute a U.S. perspective to the deliberation in this House.
I'm here on behalf of the Liberty Coalition, which coordinates public policy activities on civil liberties and basic rights in conjunction with more than 80 partner organizations from across the political spectrum. The Liberty Coalition does not, however, speak on behalf of those organizations, and my testimony today does not reflect the position of any single coalition partner.
My own particular expertise in airline reservation data is derived from more than 15 years of experience working with PNRs—passenger name records—in the travel industry and more recently working as an investigative journalist and an activist with the Identity Project, researching and documenting both what information is collected about travellers and how that information is used by both the government and private entities in the United States.
The U.S. government, which is to say the Department of Homeland Security, wants the information that would be made available by Bill for two purposes: for surveillance and for control of travellers. With respect to control, of course, this data would be part of the basis for the making of no-fly decisions and the issuance of secret no-fly orders to airlines.
Unlike the case in Canada, where someone denied travel is given formal notice of that decision and has rights to appeal it, those no-fly orders in the U.S. are entirely extrajudicial. No one in the U.S. has yet obtained court review by any U.S. court of a no-fly order. It is U.S. government policy not even to admit that they have issued such an order, and that includes those denying passage on flights overflying the U.S. that were not scheduled to land. Former Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff is on the public record as saying that he believed that no-fly decisions should not be subject to judicial review, and the current U.S. administration has done nothing to repudiate that perspective.
While the consequences for anyone are very serious, including for those U.S. citizens trapped abroad who are currently unable to return home because they are not allowed to fly and have no other way to get back to the U.S, they are perhaps most draconian for refugees and asylum seekers. You should be very clear that the enactment of Bill would grant to the U.S. government de facto veto power over the ability of virtually anyone to obtain sanctuary in Canada, since in most cases it's impossible to get to Canada to make a claim for political asylum or refugee status without overflying the U.S., and that power of the U.S. would be exercised at the worst possible point: while a refugee is still on the soil of and subject to the persecution of the regime they are trying to flee.
While the U.S. is a party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, article 12 of which guarantees freedom of movement, it ratified the ICCPR with reservations that make it impossible to invoke or enforce it through any U.S. court. In the only instance in which the U.S. DHS has even acknowledged the formal complaints of the Identity Project that its policies, including no-fly and secure flight policies, violate the freedom of movement guaranteed by the ICCPR—the only time it's been acknowledged at all—the TSA took the formal position that the ICCPR does not apply at all to any measure undertaken for reasons of national security.
You should be clear that you are dealing here--unfortunately, I have to say--with a rogue state whose declared position is that its actions in this sphere are exempt from the norms of international human rights law and even from the treaties that it has ratified.
These data are also used for purposes of surveillance of travellers. It is not the case that the information is simply used to make a one-time decision about whether to let you fly. All of your PNRs, even if you are not deemed suspicious and are allowed to fly, will be added to the lifetime travel history and compilation of data already being kept about you as part of the automated targeting system. This includes, as Professor Salter alluded to, a wide range of information. We've been coordinating efforts by individuals in the U.S.—at least, by U.S. citizens, who have some rights in this regard—to request these records. They include, for example, such things as your IP address, who paid for someone else's ticket, what friend's phone number you gave because you were staying at their house when you reconfirmed your reservations, or, in the case of two people travelling together who made their same hotel reservations in the same PNR with their flight reservations, codes indicating whether, behind the closed doors of their hotel room, they asked for one bed or two.
So we're looking literally at data down to the level of intrusiveness of who is sleeping with whom, and of course there is also the opportunity to insert into these records free-text remarks—derogatory comments by a customer service representative who didn't like your attitude, and these sorts of things—that become part of your permanent dossier with the U.S. government.
Because of their secrecy, we have only a partial idea of what data are actually included in these records and an even less complete view of how they are used. As you probably know, the Privacy Act in the U.S. grants no rights whatsoever to foreigners, so there is no legal entitlement for Canadians to find out where these data have gone. Even for U.S. citizens, the DHS has been, I regret to say again, stonewalling requests. I have been obliged, after three years of attempts to get my own dossier and an accounting of the third parties to whom it was given, to bring a federal lawsuit, which is now pending, to find out what those records are.
So far as I know, nobody has actually obtained an accounting of the third-party disclosures of their PNR data by DHS, not even U.S. citizens. While some privacy impact assessments and diplomatic assurances have been offered, it's very important to understand that those are not embodied in any treaty or in any U.S. statute or regulation. They are not enforceable and they have no more weight than any other press release.
All that said about the uses of data by governments, Bill would authorize airlines to provide these data to the U.S. and other governments. However, this may not actually be necessary, because in most cases the data are already stored in the U.S. and are already accessible to the U.S. government, with or without the permission, or even the knowledge, of the airline.
The vast majority of travel agents and tour operators in Canada, as around the world, do not store their own data. Even if you make a reservation with a Canadian travel agency to travel on a flight that doesn't overfly the U.S., or even within Canada, in the vast majority of cases that reservation is, from the moment of its creation, stored in a computerized reservation system or global distribution system based either in the U.S. or in Europe, but with offices in the U.S. from which all of that information is available.
So it's already possible for the U.S. to go to that CRS or GDS with a national security letter, order them to disclose the entirety of the PNR, order them to conceal the fact that this has happened, and even order them to deny it if asked by the airline, the travel agency, the tour operator, or the individual to whom these data pertain.
You're not being asked to provide this personal information directly to the U.S., Canadian, or any other government; you're required to provide it to an airline, which is going to provide it to other commercial partners or outsourcing providers, so it's also important to understand that these commercial entities that have the data in the U.S are subject to no privacy law whatsoever, absolutely none. They are utterly free to sell this data, use it for any purpose, or transfer it to any third party anywhere in the world. They are not obligated to obtain permission or even to disclose it to the data's subject.
I think there are grave questions as to whether the outsourcing of PNR storage to CRSs and GDSs in the U.S. by Canadian travel agencies and tour operators complies in any respect with PIPEDA, and nothing in Bill addresses this problem.
While it is not for me as someone speaking to you from San Francisco to tell Canadians what laws you should enact in your country, I certainly hope you will not follow the bad example set by the United States in turning the commercial infrastructure of the airline industry and the travel industry into a permanent infrastructure of surveillance and control of our movements, but that you will use this opportunity to take a much closer look at whether the existing norms and data flows of the industry--particularly the routine and systematic outsourcing to utterly unregulated data aggregators in the form of the CRSs and GDSs in the US—comply with existing law or require further legislation or enforcement action.
I'd be happy to answer any questions from the members.
:
Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you all for being with us today.
I think we're living in a kind of “two solitudes” world. We get the airlines and their representatives saying it would be an unmitigated economic disaster if the law is not passed, and they make passing reference to privacy concerns. Then we have the converse: that privacy or human rights are the issue, and there is little reference to the economic side.
What I've been trying to do is think of possible amendments to the bill that would not produce an economic disaster but would, at the same time, address some of the privacy concerns. One of them—and this is in reference to Professor Salter—would go some way in addressing your concerns. If the addition of third countries other than the U.S. to the list—none has asked, I believe, so far—were to require parliamentary approval rather than be done by order in council, I think that would go some way.
Now, having listened to you and Mr. Hasbrouck, I see that there is the issue of the two kinds of data. There is advance passenger information, which is minimal, and there is PNR, or passenger name records, which are extensive. I understand that the bill right now would allow or permit airlines to hand over the PNR data. Am I correct in my understanding?
Also, what would you think if we could somehow amend the bill so as to limit the information transferred to the more minimal advance passenger information?
My first question is to you, Mr. Salter.
But I first want to say, just like my colleague, Mr. McCallum, that this is a very sensitive matter because we have at play both economic interests and human rights issues. In other bills, things are not as clear-cut.
Mr. Salter, the U.S. seem to be determined to go ahead with their demands. You acknowledge that Canada is simply responding to an American requirement. What should we say to airlines such as Air Transat? Perhaps Mr. Lennox, from the Pearson airport, can also tell us what he thinks. What can we say to a carrier such as Air Transat when they tell us they will not be able to serve Central Canada or offer flights from Winnipeg, Calgary and Edmonton to Cancun and other southern destinations?
During the weekend, I thought about another aspect of the problem while talking to someone. Large carriers could say that they will bypass U.S. airspace and that they will take the Atlantic or Pacific air route to go south. However, this is not a Cessna taking off, it is an Airbus 380 or some other large chartered aircraft with passengers piled up like sardines. At takeoff and landing, they have to fly through U.S. airspace. What are we going to say to these carriers?
:
I'm just the simple airport guy at the end.
The point that I would like to make has been touched upon already. It is that right now there is a time issue concerning both Bill and the issue about U.S. sovereignty and U.S. demands with respect to what it is going to do with respect to its airspace. I believe Mr. Hasbrouck referred to the non-negotiable demands of the United States. Trying to make that balance between personal privacy and human rights versus the very real commercial economic issues is very difficult, and it sometimes defies legislative timetables.
The issue is whether we are able to have a conversation with the Americans and with others about issues of terrorism, security, and privacy and personal information. I think we have to pursue that. Perhaps a sunset clause may be appropriate.
There is a very real prospect that if you're going to be flying, you are going to be distorting travel routes in order to accommodate something that actually has nothing to do with aviation. In order to get to Mexico, you will have to fly out over the Gulf of St. Lawrence and then down the coast of the United States. That is just not something that's practical or feasible. If you're telling me that this is going to happen in short order, I can tell you that the impact on the industry is going to be considerable, although, at the same time, we as an industry do not make light of the very real concerns that have been raised at this table.
What I'm saying is that there's a conversation that is difficult to have in this timeframe, but we also have to recognize that we are dealing with Americans and with Americans' right to deal with security, whether we agree with it or not. With respect, they're not asking us for our opinion about what they do with the privacy information. That is a conversation we have to push, but I would stress the very real operational concerns that we have with respect to the impact of not following Bill .
:
All right. In a sense we've gone to the 30,000-foot level with Mr. Hasbrouck's suggestion of international negotiations around some sort of a binding treaty with binding guarantees in it. I want to come back down to ground level again about what Bill is.
First of all, it's a technical amendment to ensure Canadians don't face any undue delays with respect to their travel plans. I will remind you that we've had a lot of talk about how there should be negotiations. I have to remind those who are listening today, and perhaps our witnesses as well, that Bill actually follows a process of negotiations that has been ongoing with the United States since 2008. The minister testified before this committee, for example, that we did obtain an exemption with respect to the final rule for overflights that originate domestically in Canada, fly over U.S. airspace, and then land in Canada, so we have had some negotiation with the United States. The decision with respect to bringing in Bill was based on the reality that those negotiations were not going to produce an exemption for international overflights, and we are facing additionally the implementation deadline at the end of this calendar year. That may represent to some a bit of a Hobson's choice, but it is a reality nonetheless.
I want to get Mr. Lennox onto the record just a little bit.
We've had a lot of discussion over here on the issues of privacy. I want to come to the GTAA and its place and position with respect to the economy. We've just come through a very difficult global recession. You may want to talk about the impact to airports, airlines, and tourism industries as well as about the recovery. We have heard some good news with respect to Air Transat recalling 110 employees, for example, but the economic recovery is fragile. There is competition from U.S. airports. Can you talk about the context, economically, for your industry?
:
Fortunately, I haven't really had to look into that abyss.
You're exactly right, and it's not restricted, by the way, merely to those three airports: 75% of the Canadian population live within 200 miles of the Canadian border, so any airport within that distance that is offering any kind of service that would be impacted by this is going to suffer a leakage across the American border, and it will happen very quickly. Right now roughly 10 million passengers are flying out of Pearson airport to the United States, and another slightly more than 10 million are travelling internationally. We include the Caribbean when we calculate that. It would also include central and....
To my way of thinking, if you're flying directly to the United States, those 10 million people are probably not really at risk, because you're already providing the API information because you have to land there. Where I get concerned, and where our greatest opportunity for growth lies, is in the traffic that is going to South America, Asia, and Europe. You just simply make it easier for Canadians to go through the United States to do this because you've distorted the air routes over something that really doesn't have anything to do with aviation. As a result you're bolstering Buffalo, Bellingham, and Burlington.
I would say that airports across the country are threatened by leakage. It's something that would be happening across the country, not merely at the large airports, but I take your point.
Before I recognize Mr. McCallum, I want to note that I have passed out the calendar. I want us to make sure to note that on Wednesday, December 1, the extra meeting from 3:30 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. will be with Transport Canada officials with regard to noise and issues related to ACPPA.
The minister will be here on December 6 from 3:30 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. on supplementals, and there will be other witnesses on Tuesday, December 7, from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. I'm suggesting one hour with Air Canada on ACPPA and one hour with Nav Canada on airport noise.
I know it is a tight timeframe, but originally I think we had discussed that we would do clause-by-clause consideration on December 2. Some amendments are in, and we're asking you to get amendments to the clerk as quickly as possible.
I'm really not going to entertain much discussion until the end of the meeting, because we have Mr. McCallum's motion to deal with. It's on the order of business.
I put that out there for you to look at. We can have this discussion at the end.
Go ahead, Mr. Bevington.
In all my experience on committees, I have tended to believe that reports should be based upon the testimony of witnesses, and while I wasn't here—I've only been a member of the committee since this fall—the testimony that I've heard in regard to this matter doesn't seem to back up my colleague's recommendations.
I think back to when we had SARM, the Saskatchewan Association of Rural Municipalities, here before us. We talked about how Saskatchewan had effectively had the toughest, most difficult season in things that could get in the way. Not only did they have the elections for municipal government, which has been cited as a problem in the rest of the country in getting the projects done, but we also had the most difficult construction weather in the whole country this season. We had considerably more rain and considerably more weather-related problems.
It has been noted in other parts of the country that there were shortages of manpower and material. Well, Saskatchewan had that problem, too. When it comes to construction, we're basically tied up in part of the oil sands. We have the same demand for road construction, for heavy construction, that comes from Alberta and that area. I know it may seem a little strange to other members around this table whose constituencies have gone through a recession, but my constituency has a labour shortage, and when you have a labour shortage, it's difficult to get these projects done. I should know; I've been working with friends of mine on some private projects, and it's tough.
But amazingly, Saskatchewan appears to have got almost all of theirs done. Saskatoon, which had one of the more difficult situations, is down to two projects that may not be 100% completed. One is in the southern part of the city and is 60% completed; the other is in my constituency, and it is 90% completed.
If Saskatchewan doesn't need a six-month extension--and this was the testimony we heard here from the representatives of SARM, and I heard similar testimony from Manitoba representatives and others--then I don't see why we would go against a large amount of testimony that we had here.
The other reason I would not support this recommendation comes down to a basic element of fairness. I represent 34 municipal governments. On top of that, there are two Indian reserves in my constituency. Not all of them have the same resources when it comes to accessing municipal funds, equipment, or engineering resources. The rural municipal governments in my constituency are particularly disadvantaged, yet they played by the rules.
Actually, one of the problems is that whenever these infrastructure programs come up, they all have to bid through the same engineering firms to try to get their projects done, so it's difficult. We didn't bend the rules when it came to submitting bids; we didn't bend the rules to start. When you're a smaller municipality, you have to bid everything out, so you're disadvantaged vis-à-vis the larger ones that have their own workforces.
Fundamental fairness is at stake here. We did not change the rules so that they would give advantage to the smaller municipal governments at the beginning, yet now, because of the six-month extension, we're doing something that will assist the larger municipal governments. They always had access and could push the line a little more aggressively. They didn't have to build in as much room to manoeuvre and as much room for problems arising, because they have access to their own crews and their own equipment, which they own and possess.
I think there's a fundamental fairness question. If everyone had known from the beginning that the rules were going to be fudged, different projects would have been submitted. It's very possible that different projects would have won the bidding. That would be the second objection I have.
Let me summarize. First of all, I do not believe that witnesses' testimony backs up what is being moved in this report or what is being stated by the honourable member. Second, I don't think fundamental fairness is addressed. Those would be my two fundamental objections to this report.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
All these funding programs have specific guidelines. They are agreed to among the partners, whatever the level of government, or, as in this case with the stimulus money, through the partnerships with the municipalities and the provinces. I would be really concerned if all of a sudden we extended the terms of that agreement, because it would set a precedent such that in the future there would be nothing to stop various members from deciding that they should extend the program because the municipality they represented didn't do their due diligence and make sure that the project was completed. They could decide that there would be a lackadaisical type of attitude towards these funding programs.
We have to have structure. There has to be discipline in government to properly manage the affairs of taxpayers' dollars and budget cycles. There's that consideration for the provinces in this case, and for the municipalities. Our Minister of Finance has set out a plan for the stimulus; it would finish by March 31 so that we can pursue a further plan to address some of the deficit challenges we have as a government. I'm just concerned about the precedent this would set.
The other thing is, what is the magic number of six months? Why not three months, why not five months, why not a year? All of a sudden we've thrown it out there that there will be a six-month extension for the completion of these projects. There's no logic behind it. The minister has reported to the House that when there are challenges, he is listening to those challenges and working with our partners, but ultimately it's important to stick to the guidelines in the agreements we have established with the provinces and the other partners in this funding of the stimulus money.
I was a mayor before. If every time we applied for funding from the senior levels of government we weren't compelled to meet those deadlines and use the money that the agreements entailed, it would give you an attitude that you could just about do anything. I don't think taxpayers would feel this is the proper way to run their business. You couldn't do it in the private sector; I don't think we should do it in the public sector. We have those disciplines in place.
Once again, I want to get back to the fact that this sets a precedent. What is going to happen down the road with these guidelines set out with these funding programs? I can't understand where we're going with this.
As I said, I'd like to know from the presenter of this motion why it is six months and not three months or a year. Where did this magic number come up? Is there a detailed construction plan that says that all these things will be done in six months' time? Are we going to be dealing with this again? It's a cycle, and I would not want to get going down that road because, frankly, it would prove that we are incompetent in putting forward these funding programs and adhering to the guidelines we set initially.
Thank you Mr. Chair.
First of all, whether the work is completed tomorrow or in six months, the cost to the government is exactly the same.
Second, I am always interested when I hear someone talk about fairness. We know that in the last budget, the government invested close to $10 billion in the auto industry, which is concentrated in Ontario, as well as about $200 million in the forest industry throughout Canada while 60% of forest activities take place in Quebec. This is a very selective interpretation of fairness.
I am going to be very candid now. When it is equal for everyone, Quebec’s money is as good as Toronto’s or B.C.’s.
I think Quebec is entitled to its share. I cannot imagine people talking to me about fairness this afternoon. This gets on my nerves. If you can say these things, Mr. Trost, you do not know what fairness means. When things go your way, you are all for it. Otherwise, you are opposed.
Under the circumstances, I will vote in favour of the amendment.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I have a few points to make on the particular motion as presented.
First of all, it's my opinion that it's premature to have a report, precisely because the testimony of the witnesses has in fact been quite mixed. There have been some who appear to have a very bona fide and perhaps significant problem with it; there have been others who do not.
Second, the witnesses' testimony has been mixed as to what the resolution should be. Not everyone agreed that there should be a blanket exemption, or a blanket exemption for six months.
We also haven't heard from other witnesses who may entirely disagree. We haven't heard from the mayor of Windsor, Ontario, where, for example, projects are ahead of schedule or on time. I don't know the answer to the following question, because I haven't asked him, but were he to appear, would he agree with the idea that there should be a blanket exemption for six months? We don't know, but it's possible there are witnesses yet to come who could entirely disagree with that proposed remedy.
We also haven't heard from witnesses who were ahead of schedule and under budget, and who have already been approved for additional ISF projects to be completed by the same deadline. What are their thoughts? There are municipalities in that situation. They're spending surplus because they were in fact ahead of schedule or on time. Would they agree with such an interim report?
Mr. Chair, if the majority of members of the committee have already precluded hearing those types of witnesses—and they are out there—and have already come to the conclusion about what the remedy should be, then why should we even consider Mr. McCallum's next motion, which would be to have more meetings? Why not just conclude, forget an interim report, and have the committee give a final or concluding report? I think the testimony yet to come is just as important as the testimony we've already heard. It should give us a report, at the end of the day, that's based on the fullness of testimony.
So I'm not prepared to support this motion, and certainly not as it's written. I'm going to oppose it, and I think I have given good reasons to oppose the motion at this particular time.