Up in the air

PoliticsWatch reports on Peter Julian's plan to question Transport Minister Lawrence Cannon about last fall's secureity screening failure at Pearson International Airport:

NDP MP Peter Julian wants Transport Minister Lawrence Cannon to appear before a Commons committee to explain how 250,000 passengers weren't properly screened at Toronto's Pearson International Airport last fall.

Julian will have his motion calling for Cannon to appear debated at the next meeting of the Commons transport committee...

A work-to-rule campaign by screeners, who worked for the security firm Garda, created long lines for passengers. Screeners said in letters to Transport Canada that Garda managers took control and allowed 250,000 passengers to rush through security with minimal screening.

The Transport Canada report said that as a result no bags were searched and screening x-rays were ignored at Pearson on October 11...

Julian said he wants Cannon to explain what happened and whether the issues associated with it have been rectified.

The NDP MP also said he has questions for Cannon about why the security company had its contract renewed just weeks after the incident.

Canada's Air Transport Security Authority (CATSA) exercised its option to extend Garda's security contracts at Pearson and 27 airports across the country on November 6...

Julian also said the committee should also deal with the "broader issues" surrounding recent problems at CATSA.

Earlier this month, CATSA's chair of the board of directors, retired general Maurice Baril, resigned.

Cannon told reporters last week that Baril announced his intentions to leave "a few days after" the two men met to discuss the findings of a special examination report of CATSA by the auditor general.

The auditor general's report found that CATSA could not assure its airport screening procedures can be conducted "economically, efficiently, effectively, and in the public interest."

Needless to say, it looks there are plenty of open questions surrounding CATSA over the past few months. And there doesn't seem to be much reason why the other opposition parties would want anything but to get the answers as well, giving Julian's motion an excellent chance to pass.

Of course, Cannon seems likely to try to claim that pushing CATSA's directors out the door constitutes enough change for now. But there's little reason to think that any of the problems at Pearson or elsewhere have been solved to any meaningful extent, particularly given the renewal of Garda's contract. And with the Cons apparently asleep at the switch until CBC uncovered the breaches, it'll fall to the opposition to make sure that Canada's airports are kept safe.