There is a shortage of manpower at major Canadian airports and immigration procedures are severely congested.
After the number of travelers surged due to the easing of quarantine rules, passengers arriving at the airport are experiencing great inconvenience due to insufficient on-site manpower handling immigration.
At present, even after major quarantine rules such as mandatory pre-coronavirus screening have been abolished at airports across the country, basic quarantine procedures such as mandatory quarantine-related questions during immigration screening and instant random testing are still being implemented.
However, the confusion at the arrival hall has not been resolved for several months due to lack of preparation and shortage of manpower by the airport authorities.
There is absolutely not enough space at the airport to accommodate arriving passengers, so even when an aircraft arrives, passengers are often not able to get off immediately, resulting in hours of waiting in the cabin.
This ‘congestion’ is the worst at Toronto Pearson Airport.
A passenger who arrived from Orlando, the US on an Air Canada flight on the 16th, complained that he stayed in the plane for more than two hours after hearing the announcement that he had to wait in the plane due to circumstances at the arrival hall.
He said, “As the passengers’ dissatisfaction and anger grew, the flight attendants suffered hardships.
An airport official urged the government to make an immediate decision, saying that the only way to solve the problem is to shorten the time by completely eliminating the mandatory quarantine-related questions and random corona tests at the time of immigration.
The official said, “The current screening process takes four times longer than before the Corona crisis,” he said.
He also pointed out that “the normalization of travel and quarantine rules cannot coexist.”
In response, a spokesperson for the Department of Transportation said, “We are delighted that Canadians can travel as they did before, but there is more work to be done to ensure a full recovery.” “he said.