Office of the Auditor General Report: TRAN – February 27, 2024

Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities (TRAN) – February 27, 2024: Meeting Details

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CTA update on actions to respond to Public Accounts Committee recommendations on the OAG performance audit

Issue 1: Limited types and number of inspections

Reporting requirements

The Canadian Transportation Agency should present to the Public Accounts Committee a status report indicating what measures have been taken to implement additional oversight approaches and adjust its staffing level to enforce the Accessible Transportation for Persons With Disabilities Regulations. A final report should also be presented and include statistics on the number of inspections performed, such as those including direct observations of available services, and the number of employees responsible for enforcing the Accessible Transportation for Persons With Disabilities Regulations, in fiscal years 2022–2023, 2023–2024 and 2024–2025.

Key milestones identified in action plan

1) Pilot different PWD educational walk-throughs/shadowing models to identify the manner in which these interactions can best be integrated into our ongoing oversight programs. The models developed will include cross-disability (i.e. visually impaired, wheelchair etc.) and cross-modal (i.e. air, rail ferry, etc.) considerations to ensure the final program adequately addresses a variety of perspectives and the actual experience of travellers with disabilities.

Timeline: 2023/24 fiscal year;

2) Perform a lessons learned evaluation and consultations with PWDs and/or organizations who participated in the educational walk-throughs/shadowing activities to inform the development of the ongoing oversight program. Timeline: Q1/Q2 - 2024/25.

3) Finalize and launch ongoing oversight program incorporating the results of the educational walk-throughs/shadowing exercise. Timeline: Q4 - 2024/25 fiscal year.

Responses / reports

a) The Agency created an internal working group to develop a pilot project to obtain, first hand, information from persons with disabilities, through lived-experience. The pilot project will consist of several steps:

a. Shadowing persons with disabilities who are travelling within the federal transportation system to observe their experience and document our observations;

b. Interviewing the persons who travelled to obtain their views and understand their experiences; and

c. Performing a lessons learned evaluation with persons with disabilities in order to adapt and improve the pilot.

The collaborative oversight pilot was recently launched. It is currently focused on persons using mobility aids; however future activities will be inclusive of all transportation modes and disabilities. Following the pilot exercise, the Agency will evaluate what we have learned to develop an ongoing Collaborative Oversight Program for Accessibility and plan future activities. To date we have initiated two shadowing activities and have a third activity scheduled for March 2024.

b) Since the audit was completed, the Agency has increased its staffing level within its enforcement division by adding one new permanent regional enforcement manager position, four new permanent senior investigative positions (who we anticipate will become designated enforcement officers at the completion of their training), and one additional team member to directly support their work. Additionally, it has completed a reorganization of its enforcement division by creating Eastern and Western regional enforcement teams tasked with providing more targeted oversight of the regulated entities within their respective regions. Adding a second enforcement manager to the team ensures increased oversight of the work being performed across the country, while improving the agility of the team to anticipate and respond to emerging accessibility issues.

The Agency will provide the reports requested by the Public Accounts Committee on May 31, 2024 and May 31, 2025.

Issue 2: The CTA did not leverage complaint data to prevent barriers to accessibility

Reporting requirements

The Canadian Transportation Agency should present to the Public Accounts Committee, a status report indicating which government processes were undertaken and how much information the agency has received from transportation service providers to determine the number and nature of accessibility complaints and to classify them. A final report should also be presented.

Key milestones identified in the action plan

1) The Canadian Transportation Agency will raise this issue through the appropriate governmental processes. Timeline: Beginning in 2023.

2) CTA will explore the possibility of obtaining data directly from TSPs on a voluntary basis. Timeline: Beginning in 2023

Response / reports

The government introduced Bill C-52 on June 20, 2023. This Bill would in part, amend the Canada Transportation Act to, among other things, authorize the government to make regulations requiring transportation service providers to provide accessibility data to the government, and to allow TC and the CTA to make the information public. The Bill is currently in Second Reading in the House of Commons.

In the meantime, Agency enforcement officers will continue to use their existing inspection authorities to require the provision of information from transportation service providers in specific cases in order to monitor industry compliance with the existing regulations. For example, in December 2023, the Agency requested that Air Canada and WestJet provide data related to the all of the accessibility-related complaints that they have received from their passengers between June 2020 and December 31, 2023. This information will be used to inform future compliance monitoring activities. The information was requested to be provided by January 31, 2024. Air Canada and WestJet are currently working with the Agency regarding provision of the requested information.

The Agency will provide the reports requested by the Public Accounts Committee on March 31, 2024 and March 31, 2025.

Summary of findings

The OAG report identifies findings as it relates to the limited types and number of inspections as well as the leveraging of complaint data to prevent barriers to accessibility.

More specifically, according to their report, the OAG identified the following:

CTA

Limited types and number of inspections:

  • Due to COVID-19, the Agency relied mostly on virtual inspections, which limited the types and numbers of barriers identified.
  • Based on a sample of 14 transportation service provider inspections, between April 2021 and August 2022, the Agency identified a number of barriers and worked with the transportation service providers to remove some of these barriers.
  • The agency was following up with transportation service providers on other cases to ensure that they removed the outstanding barriers identified.
  • While the virtual and on‑site inspections looked at how services were designed, in accordance with the regulations, they did not test the actual service delivery.
  • The Agency only has the equivalent of 4 full-time employees who supported the enforcement program related to accessible transportation, which is not enough.

The organizations did not leverage complaint data to prevent barriers to accessibility

  • Lack of access to complaint data received by transportation service providers as the Agency does not have the authority to require them to provide their complaint data.
  • This limited the Agency's ability to fully understand the total number and nature of complaints and thus identify and address potential barriers to accessible
  • This creates an additional risk that the Agency is not focusing its limited resources on the areas of highest risk and that barriers could remain

The OAG concluded that:

  • The Agency did not sufficiently contribute to identifying, removing, and preventing transportation barriers for persons with disabilities through its monitoring and enforcement activities of the new regulations. While the agency identified and contributed to removing certain barriers, there were limitations in the type and volume of inspections it could conduct to progress toward barrier‑free travel. The agency also lacked the authority to access complaint data from the transportation service providers to improve its oversight.

VIA

  • conducted an inclusive consultation for their accessibility plan but subsequent actions and decisions weren't well documented
  • conducted an inclusive consultation for other projects such as service dog relief area and the design of its new train fleet but had not consistently used this approach for the design of its website
  • 17% (55 of 333) of the web accessibility standards criteria tested on VIA's website did not meet the standards
  • PWDs were not consulted on the current online information layout
  • training program are mostly complete but had at least one gap in each of the program
  • did not consult PWDs on the training offered to its management
  • Consultations on the training content for client-service staff did not fully meet the good practices
  • 39% of managers and executives did not complete the training on time and 17% had not completed it at all
  • did not analyze available complaint data as a whole to detect patterns and gain a more in‑depth understanding of the barriers faced by persons with different types of disabilities.

CATSA

  • conducted good consultation on accessibility plan
  • 15% (35 of 241) of the web accessibility standards criteria tested on VIA's website did not meet the standards
  • specific information on screening procedures and available accessibility services was hard to find on its website
  • training program are mostly complete, but did not address the role of a support person
  • prohibited from divulging security sensitive information that can be embedded in training related to screening procedures. Therefore, it was limited in the type and nature of consultative approach it could conduct on its training content.
  • did not initially realize that personnel involved in decision making needed to be trained until they were subject to a CTA compliance verification review.
  • after getting clarification from the Canadian Transportation Agency about the training requirements for this category of employees in July 2021, the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority developed a corrective action plan with updated deadlines as directed by the Canadian Transportation Agency.
  • Almost one third of managers and executives were late completing training
  • categorization of complaint data limited its ability to analyze the data to identify long‑term issues.

Action Plan – OAG report (March 27, 2023): Accessible Transportation for Persons with Disabilities

Accessible Transportation for Persons with Disabilities

Report Ref. No. OAG Recommendation Departmental Response Description of Final Expected Outcome/Result Expected Final Completion Date Key Interim Milestones (Description/ Dates) Responsible Organization/Point of Contact (Name, Position, Telephone number) Indicator of Achievement (For Committee Only)
1.61 The Canadian Transportation Agency should increase its capacity to identify accessibility barriers and enforce their removal by
  • a) implementing additional oversight approaches, such as direct observations of available services to capture the actual experience of travellers with disabilities
  • b) Reviewing and adjusting its enforcement staffing level.
  • Agreed. The Canadian Transportation Agency will look into opportunities for designated enforcement officers to gather information more directly from persons with disabilities, such as educational walk-throughs or shadowing persons with disabilities during parts of their travel experience, to better understand how services are being provided to them and will integrate this information into compliance and enforcement strategies, including those services provided upon request.
  • To ensure these approaches have the broadest possible impact, the Canadian Transportation Agency will seek participants with a range of disabilities and from various locations across Canada and will continue to engage persons with disabilities in exploring other additional innovative approaches.
  • The Canadian Transportation Agency will develop approaches in early 2023 and integrate them into the 2023–24 Compliance and Enforcement Work Plan to be piloted in late 2023 / early 2024.
  • Should the Canadian Transportation Agency receive additional funding, the agency will reassess its staffing levels, including its enforcement complement. The Canadian Transportation Agency will raise the issue of funding through the appropriate government channels this fiscal year. Whether or not funding is received, the agency will utilize compliance risk profiles of transportation service providers and the analysis of Canadian Transportation Agency complaint data and feedback received, including from persons with disabilities, to efficiently allocate its resources in the 2023–24 Compliance and Enforcement Work Plan and beyond.
 This will ultimately allow for a more complete and innovative compliance and enforcement strategy that will lead to better identifying and removing accessibility barriers March 2025
  • 1) Pilot different PWD educational walk-throughs/shadowing models to identify the manner in which these interactions can best be integrated into our ongoing oversight programs. The models developed will include cross-disability (i.e. visually impaired, wheelchair etc.) and cross-modal (i.e. air, rail ferry, etc.) considerations to ensure the final program adequately addresses a variety of perspectives and the actual experience of travellers with disabilities.
    Timeline: 2023/24 fiscal year;
  • 2) Perform a lessons learned evaluation and consultations with PWDs and/or organizations who participated in the educational walk-throughs/shadowing activities to inform the development of the ongoing oversight program.
    Timeline: Q1/Q2 - 2024/25.
  • 3) Finalize and launch ongoing oversight program incorporating the results of the educational walk-throughs/shadowing exercise.
    Timeline: Q4 - 2024/25 fiscal year.
  • 1) As the Agency received funding under the Budget 2023, it is adding FTES in the next two years and evaluating options to maximize the assignment of resources to ensure adequate oversight of the Accessibility mandate
    Timeline: 2024/25 fiscal year.
 Philippe Madgin, Director General, Determination and Compliance Branch 819-712-7424  
1.73 The CTA should identify and pursue opportunities to gather descriptive information on the number and nature of accessibility complaints filed with transportation service providers to improve its knowledge of day-to-day experiences faced by persons with disabilities. This information should be used to improve the Agency's enforcement strategy and remove additional barriers.
  • Agreed. The Canadian Transportation Agency will seek opportunities to collect data from transportation service providers on the complaints that they receive from travellers.
  • By March 2024, the Canadian Transportation Agency will explore the possibility of obtaining such data directly from transportation service providers on a voluntary basis.
  • The Canadian Transportation Agency will also raise this issue through the appropriate governmental processes starting in 2023.
 This will provide more complete data to better understand the accessibility barriers in the federally-regulated transportation system faced by persons with disabilities, and to allow for more effective approaches going forward. March 31, 2025
  • (1) The Canadian Transportation Agency will raise this issue through the appropriate governmental processes.
    Timeline: Beginning in 2023.
  • (2) CTA will explore the possibility of obtaining data directly from TSPs on a voluntary basis
    Timeline: Beginning in 2023.
 Tom Oommen, Director General, Analysis and Outreach Branch, 613-301-9261  
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