LILLEY: Trudeau government tries to deny responsibility for Canada's air travel delays – Toronto Sun

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Our airports are a disaster and somehow the Trudeau government and their supporters think they can just say, “but it’s bad in other places too!”

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Is that really a good enough answer for Canadians?

It shouldn’t be.

The truth of the matter is that our delays have been going on since the end of March. Airports like Charles de Gaulle in Paris are experiencing problems now due to a strike.

On Thursday, Air Canada was the most delayed airline in the world with 74% of flights not leaving or arriving on time, according to Flight Aware. WestJet was the third most delayed airline globally with 59% of flights delayed.

The discount brand for both carriers, Jazz and WestJet Encore, weren’t far behind them on the list.

Is this due to problems globally or here at home?

You know the answer, but let me give you some more statistics. Canada had three airports in the list of the 20 most delayed airports in the world for departing flights on Thursday – Toronto, Montreal and Ottawa. We had five of the top 20 most delayed airports for arriving flights because Vancouver and Calgary made the list along with the other three.

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We don’t have the busiest airports in the world, just the most delayed, but somehow we’re expected to believe that government policies don’t have anything to do with this.

Not a single American airport is in the top 20 for having the most delays, but five Canadian airports are. Chinese airports like Shenzhen, Shanghai and Hangzhou dominate the list in large part because of that’s country’s COVID Zero policies.

“Our policies are so powerful that they’re impacting the entire world,” a senior Liberal messaged me after a recent column on how the Trudeau government’s policies are part of the problem.

They sent links to stories of airport delays in Amsterdam, England and elsewhere.

It’s all true that air travel is a problem elsewhere and staffing issues, including for airlines, is part of that problem, but so are government policies. And to deny that, or minimize it, is to ignore the problem.

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“On our end, we have done everything we can,” Transportation Minister Omar Alghabra said earlier this week.

He said the problems at airports are due to airlines scheduling, staffing issues, etc. Yet people are still needing to show up for their flights hours ahead of time to ensure they make it through security on time. Passengers are still being delayed and held back on planes once they land because the customs area is too busy and can’t hold any more people.

Those are issues the government is directly responsible for, not the airlines or airports.

The Trudeau government just extended a number of COVID travel measures until Sept. 30, including mandatory use of the ArriveCan app. According to customs officers, the app has increased the time it takes to process passengers by 400%.

Yet Alghabra wants you to think they have done all they can to alleviate the situation.

Other countries and other airports outside of Canada are experiencing problems but none as long or persistent as what we have been dealing with here in Canada. Instead of blaming passengers or airlines as Alghabra has done, he needs to work with all parties to find a solution.

That includes the government fixing the problematic areas they are responsible for at Canada’s airports.

blilley@postmedia.com