"Domestically, Canada's travel rules are hurting small businesses, unfairly impacting families looking to enjoy the summer travel season and forcing the cancellation of conferences and events that help power local economies," the roundtable, made up of industry groups, said in a statement. The Canadian Travel and Tourism Roundtable welcomed Ottawa's latest rollback, but was not quite so optimistic on its impact. I think we're getting over that hurdle," Pasher said. "People can expect longer wait times in summer, but we shouldn't see anything like we've seen the past month. The figure will hit 80,000 within weeks, the airports council forecasts. The government continues to bar most unvaccinated foreigners from entry and requires unvaccinated Canadians to quarantine for 14 days when they return.Īfter laying off security personnel during pandemic, Ottawa said the country's airport security agency has hired 865 screening officers since April, with more to come as Canada's four largest airports gird for a 50 per cent rise in traveller numbers within weeks.Īs of June 1, those hubs were processing an average of 56,000 inbound passengers from abroad each day - more than half of them at Toronto's Pearson airport, where scenes of endless queues and traveller frustration played out all spring. The airports council and other industry groups are now calling for an end to vaccine mandates for passengers and aviation, security and customs employees, saying that hundreds more workers could be back on the job amid a labour crunch. On Friday, Ottawa announced it would pause COVID-19 tests of inbound international passengers selected at random, and that mandatory rapid tests for unvaccinated arrivals will happen off-site starting July 1. In our business we never want to see people waiting on the tarmac." "But there's still a lot more work to do, as there were still gate holds, albeit for shorter periods of time. It’s a big step forward in addressing the delay issues," council head Monette Pasher said in an interview Monday. Wait times and tarmac delays for arriving flights at large airports improved immediately after the move went into effect Saturday, according to the Canadian Airports Council and the Greater Toronto Airports Authority.
Ottawa's suspension of randomized COVID-19 testing at customs marks a major shift toward clearing clogged terminals, but more measures are needed to end airport gridlock, industry groups say.
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