Canadians are flooding Passport Canada’s Twitter
account with dozens of complaints and concerns over the
disruption of service being caused by the strike of government workers.
An April 20 update from Passport Canada
said that due to the labour disruption of striking Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC) government workers, passport service is being severely curtailed.
The federal government said it would be limiting passport processing to Canadians in humanitarian or emergency situations, on a case-by-case basis, and only at specialized passport sites. Passports and renewals will only be provided to those at risk of financial hardship, or Canadians who rely on travel for their employment whose income security would be jeopardized by lack of service.
The program will also process passports for clients who must travel for medical reasons, or who have had a death or illness in the family, and those Canadians whose situation is deemed urgent on compassionate grounds. Otherwise, the program will not process any passports that do not meet these criteria.
On a typical day, offices across the country
receive 20,000 to 25,000 passport applications. On the first day of the strike, according to the government, only 500 were processed because they were considered urgent or essential.
One person commenting
said he was supposed to pick up his passport on April 21, with a flight scheduled for April 22, and was told, “‘Sorry, we are on [strike], and good luck, when the strike ends you will hear in the news and come back to check if it will be ready.’”
Another person
said that Windsor’s passport office was not issuing passports on compassionate grounds as stated. “They consider joining my husband in the states (and my infant daughter) a ‘vacation,’” she complained on April 21. She said that without a passport, she cannot travel with her 3-month-old daughter to reunite the family, and
alleged it was a single supervisor in the office who told workers not to issue her the travel documents. “How do I escalate this,” she said.
Another man
said on April 20 that he was waiting for his passport to arrive this week, and was supposed to be travelling to India within two weeks due to a family emergency.
Another person
said his son was told to get a passport on April 24, and the office has refused to give it to him. “We have flight booked for 27th. We are losing thousands of dollars now,” he said.
A woman said she had an appointment to get her child a passport on April 28, which she booked two months ago. “I waited for the last 2 months, preparing day off from work, arranging childcare etc. How would I get my appointment and time replaced,” she
said.
Another woman said her partner went to the Calgary passport office on April 24 and came away empty-handed because the passport had not been printed before the strike started. “They would not even hear a case for hardship. They just said travel is non-essential & and you will only get passport after strike.”
She
said that her travel insurance was very clear. “They will not cover the $6k I will lose if I can’t travel because the strike prevented my passport being completed.”
Others complained that they had paid for express service before the strike began. Dozens of people asked questions about passport applications put in before the strike, or what happens with appointments where passports were supposed to be picked up. Passport Canada did not reply. The last update provided by Passport Canada, as of press time, was April 20.
A little over a month ago, on March 21, the federal government
announced it had “completely eliminated” a backlog of passport applications from 2021.
COVID-19 caused a two-year disruption in the processing of passport applications, and Service Canada was forced to double the number of employees to process travel documents last year.
Families Minister Karina Gould said on March 21 that she could guarantee that Canadians who applied for passports would get them on time, and said there were plans in place to deal with another backlog.
She may not have anticipated a strike action by government employees, however. More than 100,000 federal public servants walked off the job on April 19, causing disruptions to immigration, tax, and passport services.
The union
said on April 23 that it would be “escalating” various picket line actions and strategic locations to further impact and pressure the federal government into a new contract deal.
The Canadian Press and Isaac Teo contributed to this report.
