(Montreal) Air Canada CEO Michael Rousseau apologized for accessibility issues for passengers with reduced mobility and announced measures to improve the travel experience for hundreds of thousands of passengers with disabilities.
Mr. Rousseau announced Thursday that the air carrier would accelerate its three-year accessibility plan, after recent reports of distressing treatment of passengers with reduced mobility.
In particular, it was reported that a man with spastic cerebral palsy was forced to drag himself off a plane in Las Vegas due to a lack of assistance from staff.
Rousseau said in a statement Thursday that Air Canada recognizes the challenges faced by customers with disabilities when traveling by air and that the air carrier accepts “its responsibility to provide convenient and consistent service.”
The CEO acknowledged that the carrier was not meeting this commitment and apologized to Air Canada, while promising to “do better.”
The carrier undertakes in particular to ensure that travelers who request assistance during the transfer between the terminal and the plane are always the first to board and are seated at the front of the reserved cabin. Mobility aids, such as wheelchairs, will also be stored in the cabin “where possible”.
Air Canada also aims to implement annual and recurring accessibility training for its approximately 10,000 airport employees. The carrier also wants to include mobility aids in an application allowing baggage tracking.
The “skeptical” RAPLIQ
Francine Leduc, president of the Regroupement des activists pour l’inclusion au Québec (RAPLIQ), estimated that these measures are not new. “I don’t have the impression that these measures will be reliable or will really be put forward, or will be respected properly,” she said in a telephone interview. “I’m skeptical. »
David Lepofsky, a visiting research professor of disability rights at Western University’s law school, said that as a blind person he “feared” about flying in Canada due to the lack of reliability of the service, despite an overhaul of the regulations from 2020.
“The inconsistency with the quality of ground support you receive is appalling,” he said. The problem is that we have airlines that consistently fail to respect and obey this law, and an enforcement regime that is fatally flawed. »
Statistics Canada found that 63% of the 2.2 million people with disabilities who used federally regulated transportation in 2019 and 2020 faced a mobility barrier.
Air Canada executives spoke Thursday morning with Transport Minister Pablo Rodriguez and Kamal Khera, Minister of Diversity, Inclusion and Persons with Disabilities, following a summons from Mr. Rodriguez last week to the following several high-profile events involving disabled passengers.
These include the Las Vegas incident with Rodney Hodgins, 50, which sparked an investigation by the Canadian Transportation Agency.
This case prompted British Columbia actor Ryan Lachance, who suffers from quadruple spastic cerebral palsy, to also recount his misadventure. He claims he was dropped and injured by Air Canada staff while trying to get off a plane in Vancouver last May. The crew refused to use the lift they needed to leave their seats.
“All Canadians must be treated with dignity and respect. Point, wrote Minister Rodriguez on November 3. The company must present a plan to remedy this situation. Canadians expect Air Canada to do better. Much better. »