Air Canada cuts 1,500 jobs, suspends routes
Union pleads for airline bailout, says government is ‘letting us crash,’
Canada’s largest public sector union said the federal government is letting airlines “crash” after Air Canada laid off 1,500 employees and cut flight routes in response to harsher travel restrictions on Tuesday.
In a morning announcement, Air Canada said it will suspend service on 17 routes to the U.S. and other international destinations until at least April 30, while temporarily cutting jobs among unionized workers and an unspecified number of management positions.
“We are further reducing our transborder and international commercial schedule as a result of COVID-19,” a spokesperson for Air Canada said Tuesday afternoon. “Affected customers with bookings will be contacted with options, including alternate routings.”
The dramatic reductions in staff and services come as the company enters into its fourth month of negotiations with Ottawa over a bailout package for Canada’s struggling aviation industry. Talks began in November over a potential aid package, with Ottawa asking the airlines for refunds to custom
ers for cancelled flights and the protection of vital flight routes — concessions potentially worth billions of dollars — in exchange for a bailout.
Meanwhile, Canada has introduced stricter measures to reduce international travel, including mandatory hotel quarantines for new entrants.
Wesley Lesosky, president of the Air Canada component of CUPE, the union which represents flight attendants at Air Canada and Air Canada Rouge, blamed the cuts on the government’s travel restrictions and the stalled negotiations with the airlines.
“Workers in this sector are calling ‘mayday’ and the federal government is still asleep at the switch, letting us crash,” said Lesosky.
“Instead of working with us, the government is working against us, and one year into this pandemic, Canada remains the only country in the G7 without a plan to help the airline sector weather the pandemic, and defend tens of thousands of good jobs.”
Air Canada says its new suspensions will begin Feb. 14, including flights to New York, Boston, Washington, D.C., Seattle, Denver and Fort Myers. It’s also suspending flights to Bogota from Montreal, London and Tokyo from Vancouver, and Bogota, Dublin and Sao Paulo from Toronto.
Planned new routes from Toronto to Dubai and Hong Kong will have their start date pushed back.
The company has made periodic cuts to staff and service throughout the pandemic. In June 2020, it slashed between 50 and 60 per cent of its workforce, leaving up to 22,800 people out of a job. In January, it announced 1,700 job cuts and a reduction of regional routes to and from remote Canadian areas.
Early in the negotiations, in November, Air Canada advised governments of its intention to suspend several routes but ultimately backed down as talks proceeded.
“We are deferring the additional route suspensions and station closures pending the progress of those discussions,” the airline warned at that time.
A spokesperson from the office of Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland said that the government has provided the aviation industry with $1.7 billion in support through the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy, as well as $1 billion in support for airports and smaller airlines. Any further aid hinges on three demands, says spokesperson Katherine Cuplinskas: “1) refunding Canadians for cancelled flights; 2) retaining and reinstating regional routes in Canada; and 3) protecting jobs across the air sector.”
“We continue to emphasize this in our ongoing conversations with the airlines. In a country as vast as Canada, it’s essential we maintain connections between people and our communities.”
At the end of January, Canadian airlines agreed to suspend flights to Mexico and the Caribbean until April 30, at the the federal government’s request.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has continued to crack down on international travel, saying Tuesday that as of Feb. 15, anyone entering Canada through a land border will have to show proof of a negative COVID-19 test.
Ottawa has introduced stricter measures to reduce international travel, including mandatory hotel quarantines