Fears of a new deadly COVID-19 variant leading to new travel restrictions is ACTA’s chief worry as fall/winter approaches. “We are concerned,” association president Wendy Paradis declared at Wednesday’s ACTA Summit in Toronto, adding, “Our No. 1 priority right now is to keep (Canada’s) borders open.”

Paradis told over 300 delegates at the event that ACTA is being “assertive” and “doing everything we can” on the issue in conjunction with industry partners to ensure that pandemic travel measures such as travel advisories, mandatory testing, and quarantines are not reinstituted.

“I’ll be honest,” she said, “we’re concerned about the upcoming flu season, we’re concerned about some of the modelling, and we’re concerned about potential government action.”

She noted that after the federal government dropped those initial measures that travel bookings soared, and declared, “We want to keep it that way.”

Paradis suggested that travel agents may be called on again to write letters to or phone their members of parliament – a tactic that worked “really, really well” earlier in the pandemic – to deliver the message that “we should not be shut down on a whim like we have been for the past two years.”

Conference keynote speaker Bruce Poon Tip, founder of G Adventures agreed. “COVID is not going away – we know that, right? We’ve just got to get used to it.”

Paradis said that ACTA and its advocacy partners will be ramping up communications starting next week and will be “everywhere” preaching the benefits and safety of travel (even during a pandemic).

The travel industry will also insist that it is not treated differently than other industries “should the worst happen,” and will call for financial support from the government, specifically loan repayment forgiveness and deadlines.

“We expect support from the government,” she said. “We have made it clear (to the government) that new border measures equals new financial support. This is going to years take us to recover.”

Paradis hopes that no new border measures will come to pass, but she added, “Going into this flu season we are vulnerable, so we want to keep 10 steps ahead of the situation.”