Canada Passes Airline Passengers' Bill of Rights: 'If Airline Passengers' Rights Are Good Enough for Canada, Why Aren't They Good Enough for America?'

NAPA, Calif., Sept. 11 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- (Flyersrights.org) Kate Hanni today commended the Canadian government on the first airline passengers' bill of rights enacted on the continent. Canada's bill of rights is more comprehensive than even the European Union regulations, and specifically addresses "strandings", allowing passengers to deplane after a 90 minute tarmac delay, with the option to re-board the plane.

"If it's good enough for Canada, why isn't it good enough for America?" asked Hanni. For several months, Ms. Hanni has been assisting Mayor Woodrow French (who first proposed the bill) and House of Commons officials on background for the bill. "Now it is time for Congress to act!" added Ms. Hanni.

Under the new law, Canadian airlines will also be required to provide stranded travelers with updated flight delay and schedule change information, and meal and hotel vouchers for extended delays of four and eight hours respectively.

Transport Minister Lawrence Cannon announced the program, nicknamed "Flight Rights" at a press conference in Ottawa earlier this week. The bill received unanimous support in the House of Commons.

"The House of Commons has 308 members. Our Senate has 100. Canada was able to get 308 members to agree on a common sense law to protect their flying public in less than eight months. Our coalition has been working with Congress for sixteen months, and we can't even get a majority to agree. This underscores the degree of partisan politics and the enormous influence of big airlines with deep pockets on our system," said Ms. Hanni.

Passengers' rights legislation has been stalled in Congress primarily due to disagreements among members on funding for air traffic control modernization and related programs. Most of that legislation gives the airlines up to three hours to give passengers the right to deplane - twice the 90 minutes now required by the Canadian law.

The Coalition has 24,000 members and is the largest non-profit airline passengers rights Coalition in the world. We are joined by Consumer's Union, Public Citizen, Consumer Federation of America, USPirg, NSL, ACAP, IAM AND NATCA.