Wrapping up the National Air Accessibility Summit on Thursday, federal ministers said the airline industry has agreed to adopt a common medical form and explore improved data-sharing but did not announce new penalties for mistreating travellers with disabilities.
The summit, first promised last year, was launched in response to reports of airlines leaving passengers with disabilities to deplane without assistance and misplacing vital equipment, such as wheelchairs.
The day before the summit, Transport Minister Pablo Rodriguez said airline industry representatives were attending “in good faith” and that the federal government would consider new “penalties.”
“It could be serious consequences,” he said. “All of that will be decided after this summit.”
At the summit’s closing press conference in Ottawa Thursday, Rodriguez did not announce any new penalties. He said he wants to work with the industry first and see if they can improve the situation for travellers.
“You don’t want to get at the end when you have to impose fines … if we have to do that, that’s absolutely on the table,” he said.
Diversity, Inclusion and Persons with Disabilities Minister Kamal Khera said the planned common medical intake form for travellers will “streamline the travel preparation process, making it easier for persons” travelling with disabilities.
She said the industry has pledged to explore ways to collect and share data with the federal government and regulatory agencies to improve outcomes for travellers.
Earlier Thursday, Rodriguez and Khera hosted the first of two panel discussions. Participants included representatives from the CNIB, the Autism Alliance of Canada, Procne Navigation, Spinal Cord Injury Canada, Wavefront Centre for Communication Accessibility and the Vancouver International Airport.
Advocates ask for consistency, shift in attitudes
Joanne Smith of Spinal Cord Injury Canada told CBC News after the morning session it was important for her to be at the summit because she has seen a noticeable decline in “accessibility service and safety when travelling with a mobility impairment.”
“It’s undignifying, it’s humiliating. We should be able to travel for work and pleasure and not have to have this kind of treatment,” she told CBC News.
Smith said she’s been dropped by airline staff and has dealt with staff members who were improperly trained.
“Baseline, we need enhanced education, training and communication,” she said. “But underneath that, even more importantly, we need a shift in attitudes. There seems to be a fear or a lack of awareness of working with the disabled community.”
Maayan Ziv, the founder and CEO of AccessNow and a disability activist, told CBC News she wants to see commitments to improved data sharing and a modernized approach to travellers with disabilities.
“It was really great to show both ministers show sincerity and acknowledge the very real barriers that Canadians with disabilities are experiencing. It wasn’t sugarcoated,” she said.
The inconsistency in service for passengers with disabilities was a constant theme in the session, Ziv said.
“Sometimes you might have a good flight, other times you’re facing tremendous anxiety because your needs are overlooked,” she said.
Better data, regulations, enforcement needed, NDP says
NDP MP Taylor Bachrach, the party’s transport critic, told CBC News Thursday morning that he is hoping to see a commitment from the minister that he will do what’s required to ensure that Canada’s air sector will be more accessible after the summit.
“We’ve heard from leading disability advocates about the barriers they face. Now what’s required is political will from the minister,” he said.
It was Bachrach’s motion at the House of Commons Transport Committee that led to the study of accessibility. He says ensuring people living with disabilities can travel with dignity is a human rights issue.
“We need better data, better regulations and proper enforcement,” he said.
CBC Marketplace investigated the lack of accessible transit last fall. That report and others by CBC News prompted the MPs to call airline CEOs before a House of Commons committee to explain why they failed some passengers and how they were going to improve the situation.
‘We do make mistakes’ Air Canada CEO told committee
The House of Commons transport committee held four meetings on the subject and will be delivering a draft report in the coming months.
WestJet chief executive officer Alexis von Hoensbroech apologized for the incidents in February, saying he hoped to improve travel accessibility.
“To our guests who didn’t have a good travel experience with us, we are sincerely sorry and we are committed [to] doing better,” von Hoensbroech said during an appearance before the transport committee.
Air Canada’s CEO Michael Rousseau also faced tough questions at the committee over reports of passenger mistreatment during the past year.
“We do make mistakes,” Rousseau told the committee. He pointed to an expedited accessibility scheme announced in November, along with new measures to improve the travel experience passengers living with a disability.
‘Airlines … have to do better,’: chief accessibility officer
The parliamentary hearings followed several CBC News stories reporting incidents of mistreatment.
In one case, the federal government’s chief accessibility officer, Stephanie Cadieux, flew from Toronto to Vancouver in October on an Air Canada flight only to discover that her wheelchair had been left behind.
Cadieux said that while her chair was safely returned to her by the airline the following morning, airlines that do not provide appropriate care and attention to essential equipment like wheelchairs leave travellers vulnerable.
“I want everyone to understand that when a person’s wheelchair is lost, so is their independence, safety, mobility and dignity,” she said.
“Airlines have to take responsibility and they have to do better.”
Air Canada has apologized to a B.C. man after staff told him he would need to get to the front of the plane without any assistance. The airline has also admitted it violated Canadian disability legislation. Rodney Hodgins hopes the situation will lead to systemic change.
Rodney and Deanna Hodgins flew from Vancouver to Las Vegas in late August to celebrate their first wedding anniversary. Rodney has spastic cerebral palsy and uses a motorized wheelchair.
They say he was forced to drag himself off an Air Canada flight in Las Vegas after the airline failed to provide the assistance he needed to safely exit the plane. Deanna called the experience “dehumanizing.”
“You are watching this man grab the back of a chair and then struggle and fight while I’m on the ground, crawling on the ground moving his legs, and we’re trying to get him to the front of the plane. I’m fighting his spasms trying to lift up his legs,” she said.
Ryan Lachance, a White Rock-based stand-up comedian who has quad spastic cerebral palsy and uses a motorized wheelchair, said that in May 2023, he was dropped and injured while attempting to exit an Air Canada flight after the airline’s crew failed to bring the equipment he needed.
“It was a massive struggle to get me out of the seat. I travel with a sling underneath me to make it easier for people to pick me up. They kept pulling that and it was hurting my body, bruising my back and my hip really bad,” he said.
Emma Proulx, Lachance’s care assistant, was travelling with him at the time. She said “it was painful to watch and it was painful for Ryan to experience.”
The second panel featured representatives from airlines and airports, and included the National Airlines Council of Canada, the Canadian Airports Council, the Northern Air Transport Association, Air Canada, WestJet, the Canadian Union of Public Employees, the Canadian Labour Congress, UNIFOR and the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority.