Originally Posted by
Transpacificflyer
Air Canada's unions have been responsible and decent about this issue. Once it was established that this was an infectious deadly disease expanding exponentially, workers had a reason with which to decline working the Chinese routes. Cleaners also had a right to decline to work on aircraft which may have held carriers of an infectious disease. IMO, AC employees and contractors were about to refuse to work the China route aircraft.
The fact that Canadian government and Air Canada have lagged behind the international community is IMO politically motivated. This is demonstrated by the fact that the Canadian authorities were using the term "no human transmission", until they could no longer deny the reality and have since changed their statements to "no human to human transmission in Canada", which is an empty statement and may explain some of the public confusion. The point being that political motivations should not be taken as positions based upon actual fact.
I did read your original post before it was edited by the moderator, but I'll keep it on topic as per the above.
You say "IMO, AC employees and contractors were about to refuse to work the China route aircraft." I'm afraid your O is wrong. Right until the final day of PVG/PEK service, crews, cleaners, groomers etc had no issues working on board the aircraft that served China. The B789 that returned from PEK (or was it PVG, I can't recall) spent the night parked on a remote stand in YVR, then flew to YUL and onto BRU. There was no issue of employee/contractor reluctance to touch the airplanes. All throughout the earlier stages of the outbreak, the PVG/PEK planes returned to Canada and then departed for destinations around the world. There is no such thing as a "China route aircraft" within an airline as large and with as many routes as Air Canada. As I stated in an earlier post, the reasons to suspend the China routes were purely economical and not due to actual or imminent employee action.
You mentioned political motivation. This entire outbreak deserves calm, measured, effective response, but has been subjected to political motivation by Chinese and local governments, governments in foreign countries and the WHO itself. The desperate need to be seen "doing something" has resulted in border closures, mobility restrictions and suspension of basic services to tens of millions.
I can't wait to see what happens when our government announces where the upcoming Wuhan rescue flight will land and what will happen to the returning citizens. YVR and YYZ are the government's top two choices for the plane to arrive, although I believe each airport is lobbying for Trenton to be the landing spot. Anyway, what will you do if the 160 people land in your city? What will you demand in terms of imposed screening, quarantine, detention or restrictions?
On thing we do know: they won't return on an AC plane, so there's that to ease some frayed nerves.