Languages chief slams Air Canada
Airline missing the mark on improving bilingual services, commissioner says
OTTAWA— Canada’s official languages commissioner has once again criticized Air Canada.
Graham Fraser said Wednesday that the country’s largest airline has satisfactorily implemented just one of 12 recommendations made in 2011 about the service offered in English and French.
The other 11 have been implemented partially or not at all.
In his report, Fraser acknowledged Air Canada’s efforts to develop a new policy and directives on official lan- guages, including recruitment efforts in Edmonton.
The report also highlighted the introduction of mandatory training for flight attendants to provide bilingual services. But Fraser said that isn’t enough. To make progress, he said the airline must, without delay, officially empower senior managers. Air Canada must also provide enough money and personnel to offer services in both official languages in the air and at airports.
The airline didn’t directly address the commissioner’s report, but said its customers are generally very satisfied with its offering of services in English or French.
It pointed to an Ipsos-Reid survey of 2,600 people this year that found 91 per cent of passengers were satisfied or extremely satisfied with its service in the language of the customer’s choice. More than half found that the airline had improved its bilingual service in the last year.
Air Canada said it has focused on hiring bilingual employees, but always has trouble finding people with these skills outside of Quebec, Ottawa and Moncton, N.B.
The airline also said it has reached a tentative contract with the union that represents its 650 airport, cargo and call centre workers based in the United States.
Details of the agreement with the workers represented by the International Brotherhood of Teamsters were not available, pending ratification and approval by the Air Canada board of directors.
The tentative deal follows a 10-year agreement with Air Canada’s pilots reached last year.
That deal included a large signing bonus, wage increases of more than 20 per cent over the life of the contract and an improved profit-sharing formula. The agreement by the pilots came despite Air Canada’s troubled history with its unions.
Its last round of labour talks included a 12-hour illegal walkout by baggage handlers and ground staff that disrupted flights and the tabling of a back-to-work bill in Parliament before an arbitrator sided with the airline.