Several Canadians who recently travelled home from South Africa told CBC News they were forced to stay in government-funded quarantine hotels for an extra 23 to 36 hours after receiving negative COVID-19 test results.
“It’s a complete waste of tax money, and I think it’s an embarrassing way to treat Canadians,” said Simon Dragland.
Dragland, a TV producer who was in Cape Town for work, flew home to Toronto on Dec. 5 and was sent to a quarantine hotel. He said he got his negative test result the next day, but then didn’t hear from the federal government until 36 hours later, when a government official finally approved his release.
“I left the hotel pretty angry at the entire process,” he said. “The real frustration here is the complete lack of organization or communication.”
After the new omicron variant was identified in South Africa late last month, Ottawa recently mandated that Canadian air passengers from that country and nine others in Africa face stricter travel rules, including a COVID-19 test upon arrival. They also must spend part of a required 14-day quarantine in a government-designated hotel while awaiting the test results.
Foreign nationals who have travelled through any of the 10 countries flagged in the last 14 days are barred from entering Canada altogether.
CBC News interviewed four Canadians who travelled home from South Africa this month. Each said that after receiving their negative test results, they had to wait in their quarantine hotel for another day or two before they were officially released.
Alyna Wyatt flew from Johannesburg to her home of Toronto on Dec. 2. After getting her negative test results, she said she spent close to 36 more hours in a quarantine hotel before being released. (Submitted by Alyna Wyatt)
The travellers said they were eventually released via a phone call from a Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) official, who in three out of the four cases, checked that they had a suitable post-hotel quarantine plan.
The travellers all complained that the wait to be released was frustrating and a drain on taxpayer dollars, because Ottawa is footing the bill for the quarantine hotel stays.
“I stayed two nights to get my test results. I stayed another two nights after I got my negative test results, doubling the cost unnecessarily,” said Alyna Wyatt, an economist who was in Johannesburg for work and flew home to Toronto on Dec. 2.
After getting her negative test results, Wyatt said she spent close to 36 extra hours in her quarantine hotel room before getting permission to leave.
“You start feeling helpless,” she said about the wait. “You feel like you’re in this black hole.”
Wyatt said her release came shortly after she pleaded her case to two nurses stationed at the hotel, who had dropped by to take her temperature.
“I asked the nurses … ‘At what point do I throw myself on the floor, wailing and screaming and throwing a temper tantrum for someone to pay attention to me?'” she said. “Their response was they’re working through the backlog.”
Ottawa working to speed up process
The federal government has repeatedly said if and when Canadian air passengers from the 10 targeted African countries test negative upon arrival, they can leave their hotel and finish their 14-day quarantine at home.
However, the process is actually more complicated, as the four travellers’ experiences have shown.
According to a government information document distributed to those entering a hotel quarantine, travellers who test negative must still wait in their hotel room until a PHAC official approves their release. The document also states the wait for approval could take up to 48 hours, and those who leave without authorization risk fines of up to $5,000.
This section of a Public Health Agency of Canada information document supplied to hotel quarantine travellers states they may have to wait up to 48 hours to be released from the hotel following negative COVID-19 test results. (PHAC)
Before releasing travellers, PHAC officials need to ensure they have a suitable post-hotel place to quarantine, said PHAC spokesperson Tammy Jarbeau. She added that the agency is trying to speed up the approval process.
“PHAC is working to boost its capacity to release travellers as close to their test result as possible,” said Jarbeau in an email.
She confirmed the government is paying for the hotel quarantine costs, including transportation and three meals daily for each guest. Jarbeau was not able to provide an estimate for the cost of the program in time for publication of this story.
AG report criticizes previous hotel quarantine program
Frustration with the new hotel quarantine rules comes as Canada’s auditor general released a report criticizing the federal government’s previous hotel quarantine requirement, which was in place between February 22 and July 4 for all recreational travellers entering Canada by air.
On Thursday, Auditor General Karen Hogan tabled a report that concluded PHAC struggled to keep track of whether travellers ordered to stay in quarantine hotels actually did so. It found PHAC only had records to verify hotel stays for about one-quarter of air travellers between February and June 2021.
The AG report also follows a government advisory panel report issued in May that found the hotel quarantine program was flawed and unnecessary, ultimately recommending that it be scrapped.
Picking on some countries?
Dr. Prabhat Jha, an epidemiologist from the University of Toronto, said he feels it’s unfair to make hotel quarantine travellers endure a long wait before release.
He also said it’s unfair to force only Canadians travelling from 10 African countries to quarantine in a hotel, as the omicron variant has now spread across the globe.
“It’s picking on some countries,” said Jha, noting that people entering Canada from places such as the United States, the United Kingdom and Denmark — where omicron is rapidly spreading — are exempt from the hotel quarantine.
A more practical solution would be to allow all travellers to quarantine at a place of their choosing and ramp up COVID-19 testing, Jha said.
“If we worry about imported cases and reducing them, then really expanding testing — including home-testing — would be a key pillar,” he said.
WATCH | Canada toughens travel rules in response to omicron
Canada expands travel bans, testing requirements over omicron variant
9 days ago
Duration 1:51
Canada has expanded the list of countries from which travellers are banned and will require everyone arriving from anywhere except the U.S. to take a COVID-19 and isolate upon arrival over concerns about the omicron variant, which is already in at least four provinces. 1:51
Most travellers to Canada must take a pre-departure test and Ottawa is currently rolling out mandatory testing upon arrival for all international travellers. Those entering from the U.S. will be exempt from the arrival test, even though at least 19 states have now detected cases of the omicron variant.
During a news conference on Dec. 3, the federal government said travellers from the U.S. could eventually face stricter rules, depending on public health advice.
It also said the government imposed harsher restrictions on the 10 African countries due to a range of factors, such as their COVID-19 positivity rate, vaccination rate and their ability to detect and respond to the omicron variant.
“You have to act fast and then re-evaluate what’s going on,” said Chief Public Health Officer Dr. Theresa Tam.
But while Canada reassesses its current travel restrictions, the travellers who endured the long hotel waits say they’re speaking out to draw attention to the problem.
“Other people are [still] suffering in there,” said Dragland.
OTTAWA – The New Democrats confirmed Thursday they won’t help Pierre Poilievre’s Conservatives topple the government next week, and intend to join the Bloc Québécois in blocking the Tories’ non-confidence motion.
The planned votes from the Bloc and the New Democrats eliminate the possibility of a snap election, buying the Liberals more time to govern after a raucous start to the fall sitting of Parliament.
Poilievre issued a challenge to NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh earlier this week when he announced he will put forward a motion that simply states that the House has no confidence in the government or the prime minister.
If it were to pass, it would likely mean Canadians would be heading to the polls, but Singh said Thursday he’s not going to let Poilievre tell him what to do.
Voting against the Conservative motion doesn’t mean the NDP support the Liberals, said Singh, who pulled out of his political pact with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau a few weeks ago.
“I stand by my words, Trudeau has let you down,” Singh said in the foyer outside of the House of Commons Thursday.
“Trudeau has let you down and does not deserve another chance.”
Canadians will have to make that choice at the ballot box, Singh said, but he will make a decision about whether to help trigger that election on a vote-by-vote basis in the House.
The Conservatives mocked the NDP during Question Period for saying they had “ripped up” the deal to support the Liberals, despite plans to vote to keep them in power.
Poilievre accused Singh of pretending to pull out of the deal to sway voters in a federal byelection in Winnipeg, where the NDP was defending its long-held seat against the Conservatives.
“Once the votes were counted, he betrayed them again. He’s a fake, a phoney and fraud. How can anyone ever believe what the sellout NDP leader says in the future?” Poilievre said during Question Period Thursday afternoon.
At some point after those comments, Singh stepped out from behind his desk in the House and a two-minute shouting match ensued between the two leaders and their MPs before the Speaker intervened.
Outside the House, Poilievre said he plans to put forward another non-confidence motion at the next opportunity.
“We want a carbon-tax election as soon as possible, so that we can axe Trudeau’s tax before he quadruples it to 61 cents a litre,” he said.
Liberal House leader Karina Gould says there is much work the government still needs to do, and that Singh has realized the consequences of potentially bringing down the government. She refused to take questions about whether her government will negotiate with opposition parties to ensure their support in future confidence motions.
Bloc Québécois Leader Yves-François Blanchet hasn’t ruled out voting no-confidence in the government the next time a motion is tabled.
“I never support Liberals. Help me God, I go against the Conservatives on a vote that is only about Pierre Poilievre and his huge ambition for himself,” Blanchet said Thursday.
“I support the interests of Quebecers, if those interests are also good for Canadians.”
A Bloc bill to increase pension cheques for seniors aged 65 to 74 is now at “the very centre of the survival of this government,” he said.
The Bloc needs a recommendation from a government minister to OK the cost and get the bill through the House.
The Bloc also wants to see more protections for supply management in the food sector in Canada and Quebec.
If the Liberals can’t deliver on those two things, they will fall, Blanchet said.
“This is what we call power,” he said.
Treasury Board President Anita Anand wouldn’t say whether the government would be willing to swallow the financial implications of the Bloc’s demands.
“We are focused at Treasury Board on ensuring prudent fiscal management,” she said Thursday.
“And at this time, our immediate focus is implementing the measures in budget 2024 that were announced earlier this year.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 19, 2024.
OTTAWA – Treasury Board President Anita Anand has been sworn in as federal transport minister at a ceremony at Rideau Hall, taking over a portfolio left vacant after Pablo Rodriguez resigned from cabinet and the Liberal caucus on Thursday.
Anand thanked Rodriguez for his contributions to the government and the country, saying she’s grateful for his guidance and friendship.
She sidestepped a question about the message it sends to have him leave the federal Liberal fold.
“That is a decision that he made independently, and I wish him well,” she said.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was not present for the swearing-in ceremony, nor were any other members of the Liberal government.
The shakeup in cabinet comes just days after the Liberals lost a key seat in a Montreal byelection to the Bloc Québécois and amid renewed calls for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to step down and make way for a new leader.
Anand said she is not actively seeking leadership of the party, saying she is focused on her roles as minister and as MP.
“My view is that we are a team, and we are a team that has to keep delivering for our country,” she said.
The minority Liberal government is in a more challenging position in the House of Commons after the NDP ended a supply-and-confidence deal that provided parliamentary stability for more than two years.
Non-confidence votes are guaranteed to come from the Opposition Conservatives, who are eager to bring the government down.
On Thursday morning, Rodriguez made a symbolic walk over the Alexandra Bridge from Parliament Hill to Gatineau, Que., where he formally announced his plans to run for the Quebec Liberal party leadership.
He said he will now sit as an Independent member of Parliament, which will allow him to focus on his own priorities.
“I was defending the priorities of the government, and I did it in a very loyal way,” he said.
“It’s normal and it’s what I had to do. But now it’s more about my vision, the vision of the team that I’m building.”
Rodriguez said he will stay on as an MP until the Quebec Liberal leadership campaign officially launches in January.
He said that will “avoid a costly byelection a few weeks, or months, before a general election.”
The next federal election must be held by October 2025.
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre said he will try to topple the government sooner than that, beginning with a non-confidence motion that is set to be debated Sept. 24 and voted on Sept. 25.
Poilievre has called on the NDP and the Bloc Québécois to support him, but both Jagmeet Singh and Yves-François Blanchet have said they will not support the Conservatives.
Rodriguez said he doesn’t want a federal election right away and will vote against the non-confidence motion.
As for how he would vote on other matters before the House of Commons, “it would depend on the votes.”
Public Services and Procurement Minister Jean-Yves Duclos will become the government’s new Quebec lieutenant, a non-cabinet role Rodriguez held since 2019.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 19, 2024.
— With files from Nojoud Al Mallees and Dylan Robertson
