still deters visitors “because it’s a perception of whether Canada is open or not. And compared to other countries, particularly our G7 rivals — the UK, Italy — who’ve gotten rid of vaccine mandates to get into the country, we’re obviously still lagging behind them. When people are making decisions at the dinner table when they’re going to travel, they want to have a risk-free and bureaucratic-free experience as possible and Canada is unfortunately not at the top of that list right now.
Manvir Hundal, press secretary for newly appointed tourism minster Neil Lumsden, said “our government has taken serious action to help the tourism and hospitality sectors following the impacts of the pandemic, including the Ontario Staycation Tax Credit to encourage Ontarians to support local tourism.”
“But it’s still just over 10 per cent below what we saw in 2019,” she said, noting that major conferences and events have yet to rebound. The tourism industry is not expected to recover until 2025 or 2026, and an ongoing labour shortage has also added to the sector’s woes. However, he added, “throughout the pandemic, the business has been almost exclusively domestic leisure,” which plays a big part, but not enough on its own.
Has that promised money for the Ontario tourism sector been released to help?
If only GO transit reached further and VIA ran more frequent. Rental car & hotel/motel shortage are too real.
Because hotel prices are astronomical
HERE IT IS FINALLY HE ADMITS IT !!!
That's because the pandemic is not over .... without a mask mandate I do different things now and having a great time
We don't have to worry about foreigner tourists coming here anytime soon.
Too bad we put Ford back into office.
Do people actually believe this horror movie is over. Far from it.