Hey, look everybody, I finally have a stalker. :D

Canada’s October 19 election that saw the Justin Trudeau-led Liberal party voted into government has raised hopes the two countries will be able renegotiate the allocation. UAE General Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA) Director General, Saif Mohammad Al Suwaidi, told Gulf News on October 22 that he plans to discuss “the requirements of our carriers” with the new government.

But Bureau said Air Canada will “absolutely” make sure Canada’s new government knows it opposes any more flights for the UAE carriers. “The capacity that is currently being deployed is more than adequate to service the true demand,” he said.

http://gulfnews.com/business/aviatio...ihad-1.1614329

So its not totally far fetched to say that AC is running YYZ-DXB to "prove" there is no O/D demand on the route. Even if they lose money, the stakes are huge here. Well worth taking a short term loss.

Hopefully the new government will end the AC subsidy.

Seems Bureau has lost his compass, this sounds more like he's telling Ottawa what to do instead of asking/wishing/negotiating with them.

What's to say Ottawa won't help AC out if they lose money in the future? His golden parachute just might not be there next time when they need it.

With the charisma this Trudeau Prime Minister has he could be in power multiple terms, and if I were Bureau I would choose my wording, and actions very, very carefully.

With Canada's GDP drastically dropping because of cheap oil they need to find new methods/strategies of driving the economy, and not being so reliant on oil.

I've noticed Bombardier's stocks have drastically dropped last week mostly because of the C Series program. They gave the company a 1 billion CAD life line, plus taking if I'm correct a fifty percent share of the program. Now what a bargaining tool countries like Qatar have when it comes to buying the C Series which they have shown interest in. Even Turkey would buy the C Series just to open up the Canadian market.

The UAE still hasn't chosen which passenger trains they will purchase for their new, and upcoming National Railroad project.

Now since the government has vast interest in Bombardiers vested long term success who certainly employ more Canadians than AC, I think it's a no brainier which way the governments business policies will swing to.

I also think YYZ has so much more potential if Canada ended it's protectionist policy.

I could completely agree with you; it's definitely weird to start a route one day, and the next day say that the capacity on the route is 'more than adequate to service the true demand'. At the very least, it shows AC has very little optimism in growing the route!

Although, I would imagine that Air Canada won't have much of a case to be made if discussions take place in the next few months. Several months of operational data might not be a compelling case, as it can take months or even years to make a route profitable.

Nonetheless, it will be interesting to see how this all plays out.

Says who? SQ use to fly SIN-VIE-AMS-YYZ and wanted to introduce more fifth freedom routes but once again AC opposed because they said SQ was poaching customers. AC complained to the government. The government caved in and gave SQ the rights to continue flying to YYZ but without any fifth freedom traffic.

SQ packed up and shortly there-after launched service to JFK.

Well, we can probably thank the new Liberal government for part of the drop. Their commitment to not let jets into YTZ definitely didn't help BBD.

I think this is a bit more complex and also has to do with the level of autonomy and the lack of government oversight over the airport authority (unless something has fundamentally changed in this space in the past 2 years - I admit, I have not been following too closely). Airports need to be competitive.

Agreed! The first thing would be for the government to stop charging rent to the airports and treating them as a cash cow. More flights means more economic activity which translates to more tax revenue.

I did notice on a recent episode of Ultimate Airport Dubai that the new train shuttling between terminals was made by Canada's Bombardier.

That's correct, the concourse D APM was chosen a few years ago which was a good sign of UAE-Canada relations getting better.

Also today the UAE bought two Global 6000 air frames which will be equipped with SAAB surveillance electronics for a cost of 1.27 billion USD.

http://i.imgur.com/O0L52hx.jpg?1

What Emirates needs to do is buy Bombardier C series jets... ;)

The only use EK would have from the C Series is shuttling pax from one concourse to the other at DXB, it's just to small for their needs.

Air Arabia is negotiating for a few as we speak.