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Canada's airlines ease into expanded summer service with added safety protocols – CBC.ca

Published

4 years ago

June 15, 2020

Canada’s beleaguered airline industry is taking cautious steps to restart operations after travel restrictions brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic grounded much of the sector — but getting planes back in the air will be a costly and risky undertaking.

Flair Airlines is one Canadian carrier ramping back up operations next month. In July, the low-cost domestic airline, which launched three years ago, will expand its routes across the country.

But even though many Canadians are hesitant about boarding a plane, airlines need to start offering flights with more safety measures so the industry can recover, said Flair CEO Jim Scott.

“It’s a chicken and an egg problem. You can’t attract passengers if you don’t have a flight,” Scott told CBC News. “If you have a flight and people don’t show up, you have to operate it. If you operate it at a loss, eventually you’ll go out of business.”

Scott said that operating an airline at this time is a juggling act that involves estimating how much traffic will return to the industry and matching that to the industry’s ability to accommodate it — all at a rate that breaks even or generates revenue on every flight.

“If we get it wrong, we can lose an awful lot of money,” he said.

The company has already let go of 50 per cent of its workforce because of the pandemic and cancelled a planned expansion into the Maritimes due to provincial travel restrictions and quarantine rules.

Flair Airlines CEO Jim Scott says air travel has become a “surreal” experience because of the many safety protocols undertaken by passengers and staff — measures he says are necessary for an airline to operate in the middle of a pandemic. (Mike Zimmer)

Daunting process for many airlines

It’s a similar story for other airlines: Air Canada announced in May that it was slashing its workforce by 50 to 60 per cent, while WestJet laid off half its 14,000-member workforce in March before rehiring most of them under the federal government’s wage subsidy program.

Flair took advantage of that program, but Scott said topping up employees’ salaries is still costly. The carrier is in the midst of private talks with Ottawa for tens of millions of dollars in loans because the airline doesn’t bring in enough revenue to qualify for the government’s offer of bridge financing for large Canadian businesses.

Bigger carriers who do qualify for the financing haven’t said whether they’ll sign on and say they’re looking into the conditions tied to receiving it.

An Air Canada worker cleans her ticketing station at Pearson International Airport in Toronto in April 2020. The airline revealed last month that it would be laying off more than 20,000 employees from its workforce. (Nathan Denette/Canadian Press)

Canadian airlines have chosen to ramp up operations for the coming season despite those circumstances.

After cutting 90 per cent of its operations, Flair is inching back up to 30 per cent of normal operations in order to expand its routes.

Air Transat revealed last week that it expects to resume its flights on July 23 to almost two dozen international destinations including France, Italy and Mexico as long as travel restrictions at that time allow it.

Air Canada is also adding more international destinations to its slate including London, Paris and Frankfurt, while WestJet said in an email to CBC that it was “working through an updated July schedule that will include an increase in daily flight frequencies.”

“While increased flying is a positive sign, it is important to remember that we are only flying five per cent of our schedule and an increase in flight numbers is not an indication of our recovery or return to normal operations,” the email read.

Glamour is gone, Scott says

Expanding service amid a public health crisis means air travel has become an entirely new experience.

“The glamour is out of flying right now,” said Scott. “People are very quiet. They board the airplane with social distancing. I think the social element of flying, talking to a neighbour, meeting people, having jokes with flight attendants and so on, those days are gone for now.”

A number of safety measures are already in place in airports across the country, including a requirement for all passengers and staff to wear masks, the completion of health-screening questionnaires and enhanced cleaning protocols.

Passengers travelling to, from or within Canada will have to undergo mandatory temperature checks before boarding. Some airlines are already doing this, including Air Canada, WestJet and Flair Airlines.

Like other airlines, passengers about to board a Flair aircraft must first answer a basic health questionnaire and get their temperature checked. (CBC News)

Flying itself is now significantly different: some airlines have suspended food and beverage service, while others no longer distribute pillows and blankets.

Airlines are also disinfecting their planes with medical-grade cleaning products between flights.

Flair’s fleet is sanitized before every trip, and passengers on connecting flights must deplane when they stop in a new city while the plane is cleaned again. The company is “fogging” down the aircraft with a sanitizer procured from Germany.

In other measures, passengers on Air Transat flights will be given their own face covering, gloves, sanitizer and wipes. Air Canada passengers can expect to receive a similar kit, along with an empty seat directly adjacent to their own.

WATCH | How Flair Airlines disinfects its fleet:

John Mullins, Flair’s vice president of customer experience and airports, says airlines used to dust. Now, they deep clean. 0:34

Passengers cautious too

Passengers will be guarded when entering this new era of air travel, said Ian Jack, a spokesperson for the Canadian Automobile Association (CAA).

“I think a lot of people today are simply worried that we’ll have a repeat of March [and] April where they’ll buy a ticket, they’ll spend potentially thousands of dollars and then the flight will get cancelled … because we got a COVID outbreak somewhere in the world,” said Jack, whose association is also a consumer group that previously fought for air passenger rights.

Jack said those embarking on air travel this summer should be particularly diligent about checking travel advisories and rules about refunds.

“The biggest concern is that … people are going to get burned again,” Jack said. “Either they’re not going to be able to fly where they want to go and they won’t get a refund, or that they’re going to get to their destination and find that things are closed.”

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Justin Trudeau’s Announcing Cuts to Immigration Could Facilitate a Trump Win

Published

3 hours ago

November 5, 2024

Nick Kossovan

Outside of sports and a “Cold front coming down from Canada,” American news media only report on Canadian events that they believe are, or will be, influential to the US. Therefore, when Justin Trudeau’s announcement, having finally read the room, that Canada will be reducing the number of permanent residents admitted by more than 20 percent and temporary residents like skilled workers and college students will be cut by more than half made news south of the border, I knew the American media felt Trudeau’s about-face on immigration was newsworthy because many Americans would relate to Trudeau realizing Canada was accepting more immigrants than it could manage and are hoping their next POTUS will follow Trudeau’s playbook.

Canada, with lots of space and lacking convenient geographical ways for illegal immigrants to enter the country, though still many do, has a global reputation for being incredibly accepting of immigrants. On the surface, Montreal, Toronto, and Vancouver appear to be multicultural havens. However, as the saying goes, “Too much of a good thing is never good,” resulting in a sharp rise in anti-immigrant sentiment, which you can almost taste in the air. A growing number of Canadians, regardless of their political affiliation, are blaming recent immigrants for causing the housing affordability crises, inflation, rise in crime and unemployment/stagnant wages.

Throughout history, populations have engulfed themselves in a tribal frenzy, a psychological state where people identify strongly with their own group, often leading to a ‘us versus them’ mentality. This has led to quick shifts from complacency to panic and finger-pointing at groups outside their tribe, a phenomenon that is not unique to any particular culture or time period.

My take on why the American news media found Trudeau’s blatantly obvious attempt to save his political career, balancing appeasement between the pitchfork crowd, who want a halt to immigration until Canada gets its house in order, and immigrant voters, who traditionally vote Liberal, newsworthy; the American news media, as do I, believe immigration fatigue is why Kamala Harris is going to lose on November 5^th.

Because they frequently get the outcome wrong, I don’t take polls seriously. According to polls in 2014, Tim Hudak’s Progressive Conservatives and Kathleen Wynne’s Liberals were in a dead heat in Ontario, yet Wynne won with more than twice as many seats. In the 2018 Quebec election, most polls had the Coalition Avenir Québec with a 1-to-5-point lead over the governing Liberals. The result: The Coalition Avenir Québec enjoyed a landslide victory, winning 74 of 125 seats. Then there’s how the 2016 US election polls showing Donald Trump didn’t have a chance of winning against Hillary Clinton were ridiculously way off, highlighting the importance of the election day poll and, applicable in this election as it was in 2016, not to discount ‘shy Trump supporters;’ voters who support Trump but are hesitant to express their views publicly due to social or political pressure.

My distrust in polls aside, polls indicate Harris is leading by a few points. One would think that Trump’s many over-the-top shenanigans, which would be entertaining were he not the POTUS or again seeking the Oval Office, would have him far down in the polls. Trump is toe-to-toe with Harris in the polls because his approach to the economy—middle-class Americans are nostalgic for the relatively strong economic performance during Trump’s first three years in office—and immigration, which Americans are hyper-focused on right now, appeals to many Americans. In his quest to win votes, Trump is doing what anyone seeking political office needs to do: telling the people what they want to hear, strategically using populism—populism that serves your best interests is good populism—to evoke emotional responses. Harris isn’t doing herself any favours, nor moving voters, by going the “But, but… the orange man is bad!” route, while Trump cultivates support from “weird” marginal voting groups.

To Harris’s credit, things could have fallen apart when Biden abruptly stepped aside. Instead, Harris quickly clinched the nomination and had a strong first few weeks, erasing the deficit Biden had given her. The Democratic convention was a success, as was her acceptance speech. Her performance at the September 10th debate with Donald Trump was first-rate.

Harris’ Achilles heel is she’s now making promises she could have made and implemented while VP, making immigration and the economy Harris’ liabilities, especially since she’s been sitting next to Biden, watching the US turn into the circus it has become. These liabilities, basically her only liabilities, negate her stance on abortion, democracy, healthcare, a long-winning issue for Democrats, and Trump’s character. All Harris has offered voters is “feel-good vibes” over substance. In contrast, Trump offers the tangible political tornado (read: steamroll the problems Americans are facing) many Americans seek. With Trump, there’s no doubt that change, admittedly in a messy fashion, will happen. If enough Americans believe the changes he’ll implement will benefit them and their country…

The case against Harris on immigration, at a time when there’s a huge global backlash to immigration, even as the American news media are pointing out, in famously immigrant-friendly Canada, is relatively straightforward: During the first three years of the Biden-Harris administration, illegal Southern border crossings increased significantly.

The words illegal immigration, to put it mildly, irks most Americans. On the legal immigration front, according to Forbes, most billion-dollar startups were founded by immigrants. Google, Microsoft, and Oracle, to name three, have immigrants as CEOs. Immigrants, with tech skills and an entrepreneurial thirst, have kept America leading the world. I like to think that Americans and Canadians understand the best immigration policy is to strategically let enough of these immigrants in who’ll increase GDP and tax base and not rely on social programs. In other words, Americans and Canadians, and arguably citizens of European countries, expect their governments to be more strategic about immigration.

The days of the words on a bronze plaque mounted inside the Statue of Liberty pedestal’s lower level, “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free…” are no longer tolerated. Americans only want immigrants who’ll benefit America.

Does Trump demagogue the immigration issue with xenophobic and racist tropes, many of which are outright lies, such as claiming Haitian immigrants in Ohio are abducting and eating pets? Absolutely. However, such unhinged talk signals to Americans who are worried about the steady influx of illegal immigrants into their country that Trump can handle immigration so that it’s beneficial to the country as opposed to being an issue of economic stress.

In many ways, if polls are to be believed, Harris is paying the price for Biden and her lax policies early in their term. Yes, stimulus spending quickly rebuilt the job market, but at the cost of higher inflation. Loosen border policies at a time when anti-immigrant sentiment was increasing was a gross miscalculation, much like Trudeau’s immigration quota increase, and Biden indulging himself in running for re-election should never have happened.

If Trump wins, Democrats will proclaim that everyone is sexist, racist and misogynous, not to mention a likely White Supremacist, and for good measure, they’ll beat the “voter suppression” button. If Harris wins, Trump supporters will repeat voter fraud—since July, Elon Musk has tweeted on Twitter at least 22 times about voters being “imported” from abroad—being widespread.

Regardless of who wins tomorrow, Americans need to cool down; and give the divisive rhetoric a long overdue break. The right to an opinion belongs to everyone. Someone whose opinion differs from yours is not by default sexist, racist, a fascist or anything else; they simply disagree with you. Americans adopting the respectful mindset to agree to disagree would be the best thing they could do for the United States of America.

______________________________________________________________

Nick Kossovan, a self-described connoisseur of human psychology, writes about what’s

on his mind from Toronto. You can follow Nick on Twitter and Instagram @NKossovan.

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Former athletes lean on each other to lead Canada’s luge, bobsled teams

Published

4 hours ago

November 5, 2024

Anne Joseph

CALGARY – Sam Edney and Jesse Lumsden sat on a bench on Parliament Hill during an athlete celebration after the 2014 Winter Olympic Games.

Having just represented Canada in their sliding sports — Lumsden in bobsled and Edney in luge — the two men pondered their futures together.

“There was actually one moment about, are we going to keep going? Talking about, what are each of us going to do? What’s the next four years look like?” Edney recalled a decade later.

“I do remember talking about that now. That was a big moment,” Lumsden said.

As the two men were sounding boards for each other as athletes, they are again as high-performance directors of their respective sliding sports.

Edney, an Olympic relay silver medallist in 2018 and the first Canadian man to win a World Cup gold medal, became Luge Canada’s HPD upon his retirement the following year.

Lumsden, a world and World Cup bobsled champion who raced his third Olympic Games in 2018, leaned on his sliding compatriot when he returned from five years of working in the financial sector to become HPD at Bobsleigh Canada Skeleton in July.

“The first person I called when BCS reached out to me about the role that I’m in now is Sam,” Lumsden said recently at Calgary’s WinSport, where they spent much of their competitive careers and now have offices.

“It’s been four months. I was squatting in the luge offices for the first two months beside him.

“We had all these ideas about we’re going to have weekly coffees and workouts Tuesday and Thursday and in the four months now, we’ve had two coffees and zero workouts.”

Canada has won at least one sliding-sport Olympic medal in each of the last five Winter Games, but Edney and Lumsden face a challenge as team leaders that they didn’t as athletes.

WinSport’s sliding track, built for the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary and where Edney and Lumsden did hundreds of runs as athletes, has been closed since 2019 needing a $25-million renovation.

There is no sign that will happen. WinSport took the $10 million the provincial government offered for the sliding track and put the money toward a renovation of the Frank King Lodge used by recreational skiers and snowboarders.

Canada’s only other sliding track in the resort town of Whistler, B.C., has a fraction of Calgary’s population from which to recruit and develop athletes.

“The comparison is if you took half the ice rinks away in the country, hockey and figure skating would be disarray,” Edney said.

“It just changes the dynamic of the sports completely, in terms of we’re now scrambling to find ways to bring people to a location that’s not as easy to get to, or to live out of, or to train out of full time.

“We’re realizing how good we had it when Calgary’s (track) was here. It’s not going to be the end of us, but it’s definitely made it more difficult.”

Lumsden, a former CFL running back as well as an Olympian, returned to a national sport organization still recovering from internal upheaval that included the athlete-led ouster of the former president and CEO after the 2022 Winter Olympics, and Olympic champion pilot Kaillie Humphries suing the organization for her release to compete for the U.S. in 2019.

“NSOs like Luge Canada and Bobsleigh Canada Skeleton, they’re startups,” Lumsden said. “You have to think like a startup, operate like a startup, job stack, do more with less, especially in the current environment.

“I felt it was the right time for me to take my sporting experience and the skill set that I learned at Neo Financial and working with some of the most talented people in Canada and try to inject that into an NSO that is in a state of distress right now, and try to work with the great staff we have and the athletes we have to start to turn this thing around.”

Edney, 40, and Lumsden, 42, take comfort in each other holding the same roles in their sports.

“It goes both ways. I couldn’t have been more excited about who they hired,” Edney said. “When Jesse was coming in, I knew that we were going to be able to collaborate and work together and get things happening for our sports.”

Added Lumsden: “We’ve been friends for a long time, so I knew how he was going to do in his role and before taking the role, having the conversation with him, I felt a lot of comfort.

“I asked ‘are you going to be around for a long time?’ He said ‘yeah, I’m not going anywhere.’ I said ‘OK, good.'”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 4, 2024.

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Billie Jean King Cup and Davis Cup encourage donations for Spanish flood recovery efforts

Published

4 hours ago

November 5, 2024

Anne Joseph

MALAGA, Spain (AP) — With the finals of the Billie Jean King Cup and Davis Cup set to be played in Malaga, Spain, this month, the International Tennis Federation is making a donation to the Spanish Red Cross to support relief and recovery efforts for the recent catastrophic flooding in the country.

The ITF and its two team tournaments said in a news release Tuesday that they “express their deepest sympathy to the victims and support for the communities and families affected by the devastating floods in Spain and its regions.”

The Billie Jean King Cup and Davis Cup, along with the ITF, “are donating to the Cruz Roja, and we encourage all our fans and followers to contribute as well.”

The ITF did not say how much it is donating.

Authorities have recovered more than 200 bodies in the eastern Valencia region after heavy downpours caused flash flooding. Police, firefighters and soldiers continued to search Tuesday for an unknown number of missing people.

The Billie Jean King Cup matches are scheduled for Nov. 13-20, and the Davis Cup — the last event of 22-time Grand Slam champion Rafael Nadal’s career — is set for Nov. 19-24, all in Malaga.

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AP tennis:

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