Air Canada to temporarily cut 1,500 jobs, suspend 17 foreign routes

MONTREAL – Air Canada will temporarily lay off 1,500 unionized employees and an unspecified number of management staff as it cuts more routes in response to harsher travel restrictions.

The airline will temporarily suspend service on 17 routes to the U.S. and other international destinations until at least April 30, the company said Tuesday.

Air Canada says the further reduction in its transborder and international commercial schedule is due to COVID-19, promising affected customers with bookings will be contacted with options, including alternate routings.

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The route suspensions in the U.S. include flights to New York, Boston, Washington, D.C., Seattle, Denver and Fort Myers, Air Canada said. The earliest flight suspensions to the U.S. will go into effect Feb. 14.

Air Canada is also suspending flights to Bogota from Montreal, London and Tokyo from Vancouver, and Bogota, Dublin and Sao Paulo from Toronto, among other routes, the company said.

Flights from Toronto to Tel Aviv will continue to be suspended, and flights from Toronto to Dubai and Hong Kong will have their startups postponed.

The layoffs and route cuts come as Canada rolls out stricter measures to reduce international travel, including mandatory hotel quarantines for new entrants.

Wesley Lesosky, president of the Air Canada Component of CUPE, which represents flight attendants at Air Canada and Air Canada Rouge, blamed the cuts on the government’s new travel restrictions and said Ottawa wasn’t doing enough to help the airline sector weather the pandemic.

“We appreciate the need for measures to prevent the spread of new variants of COVID-19 in Canada,” Lesosky said. “But restrictions have to be accompanied by solutions.”

At the end of January, Canadian airlines agreed to suspend all flights to Mexico and the Caribbean until April 30, at the request of the federal government.

Related articles:

• Negative COVID-19 test to be required at Canada’s land borders starting Feb. 15

• Air Canada slashes capacity, cutting more jobs and service to Atlantic Canada

Last week, Air Canada said it planned to temporarily halt operations at Air Canada Rouge, which primarily operates the company’s flights to Mexico and the Caribbean. The service cuts involved temporary layoffs of around 80 employees.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has continued to crack down on international travel, saying Tuesday that as of Feb. 15, anyone entering Canada through a land border will have to show proof of a negative COVID-19 test.

A previous requirement for international travellers to show negative test results, which went into effect on Jan. 7, applied only to air travel. Airlines said they saw an immediate drop in bookings once the requirement was implemented, leading to another round of route cuts and layoffs by Canadian carriers in January.