Lack of Border Opening Plan Infuriating: Trudeau Needs To Talk Now

July 8, 2021 Jim Byers

It’s beyond ridiculous.

The Canada-US border has been pretty much closed for 16 months. The current border closure order expires July 21, which is 13 days from now.

Mom and pop tour operators from the Yukon to southern Ontario to western Newfoundland and Labrador are scratching their heads, trying to figure out if they need to hire guides for a potential increase in foreign visitors. Hotels in Montreal and Victoria are wracking their brains and hoping to know how much steak or wine to order for late July or early August for any Americans who might want to head over the border into a country they haven’t been allowed to visit. Residents of Washington state and upstate New York are dying to visit their family and friends on the other side of the border, or to visit a cottage they haven’t set foot in for the better part of a year and-a-half.

But what do we hear from the federal government? Virtually nothing.

Vaccinations in Canada are rising faster than property values in Vancouver and Toronto, yet Prime Minister Justin Trudeau can’t seem to provide any kind of realistic target to help devastated tourism and travel businesses understand what might be next.

A couple months ago, Trudeau said Ottawa could ease travel restrictions once 75% of Canadian adults had one vaccine and 20% had two doses. Canada reached that target some time ago, and the federal government did (on July 5) ease quarantine restrictions.

Canadians and permanent residents, along with others allowed entry into the country (and good luck figuring that out), can now come back into the country without having to undergo a 14-day quarantine. They also can skip the controversial quarantine hotel program.

But that does nothing to help damaged tourism businesses in Canada. If anything, it’s made things worse by allowing fully vaccinated Canadians to leave the country and spend their tourism dollars elsewhere, without providing any kind of increase in foreign visitors to balance that out.

Trudeau recently seemed to up the ante on vaccination requirements, suggesting he’d like to see something close to 80% of Canadians with two vaccine doses before significantly altering border rules.

According to Vaccine Tracker Canada, 78.42% of Canadian adults have received their first vaccine dose, while 44.16% have two doses.

The next border closure order runs out on Wednesday, July 21. Ottawa has traditionally announced its decisions a few days prior to the day the orders expire, which suggests an announcement could come a week from tomorrow (Friday, July 16) or perhaps Monday July 19.

That’s only a short time away. But merchants and tour operators and restaurant owners across the country have NO IDEA what lies ahead.

Tourism groups have held several press conferences in the past month or so, hoping to generate some pressure on the Canadian government. But it doesn’t seem to have done much. Instead, we get Trudeau endlessly jabbering about “weeks not months,” which is of zero help to a Canadian tourism industry that represents one in ten jobs in the country.

In an editorial with the headline “Making It Up As They Go: The Liberals Don’t Seem to Have a Plan for the Border,” Globe and Mail columnist Campbell Clark today said it seems Trudeau is basing his decision mostly on public opinion polls, which have generally shown a reticence to open the border.

“It’s episodic. It’s piecemeal. And that suggests they’re making it up as they go along,” said Goldy Hyder, the president and chief executive officer of the Business Council of Canada. Business groups want the border to start opening, and unsurprisingly, the tourism industry does, too. First, they want to hear the plan,” the Globe said.

That’s all people have been asking for. A plan. Canoe guiding companies in Lake of the Woods need to know if they need to hire staff now, or in August, or next year. Restaurants in Whistler need to know if they should be seeking wait staff for late July or late November.

Is that really too much to ask?

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