Labour Day train delay isolated incident, Via Rail CEO tells MPs

OTTAWA — The head of Via Rail repeatedly told MPs a train delay over the Labour Day long weekend was an isolated incident, despite a similar event two years ago.

Mario Péloquin appeared in front of a parliamentary committee Thursday to answer to an incident between Montreal and Quebec City that stranded passengers for 10 hours as they ran out of food, water and working toilets.

MPs pressed Via Rail executives about why the incident occurred even though Via Rail made changes following similar disruptions during the 2022 holiday season.

“Although we know now that it was not a single failure but a series of events, unfortunately, the breakdown of two weeks ago reminds us of what happened in December 2022,” Péloquin said.

“While Via Rail successfully implemented the key learnings and recommendations from 2022, this most recent incident revealed significant shortcomings which we are addressing.”

“I want to reiterate that I am deeply sorry for what happened,” he said.

Péloquin said the delays in 2022 were caused by an ice storm that had caused a tree to fall on the railway, while the latest incident was due to two separate mechanical failures.

Ottawa has already told Via Rail to make changes and asked it to conduct an independent investigation into the incident.

Péloquin said the company has now implemented a new evacuation process, but it wouldn’t have done much good in the latest incident because the train was in an area where evacuation was unsafe.

Conservative MP Philip Lawrence read out a list of previous delays, and asked Péloquin whether he could “with a straight face say this was isolated.”

Péloquin said Via Rail has 20,000 departures a year and 80 per cent arrive on time or within 30 minutes, and that some of those incidents were caused by events outside of Via Rail’s control, such as suspicious packages.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 19, 2024.

Anja Karadeglija, The Canadian Press