OTTAWA -- The mother of an Ontario boy who has endured frustrating airport snags welcomed the news Thursday that Canada and the United States will work to clear up confusion over mistaken identities on no-fly lists.
Khadija Cajee, an unofficial spokeswoman for families with young children entangled by security delays, said she was very pleased to hear that the two countries have made the issue a priority.
"We hope they continue to address this with the expediency and urgency it requires since innocent people's lives are being affected," said Cajee, of Markham, Ont.
Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale promised to investigate after Cajee's six-year-old son Adam had trouble boarding an Air Canada flight to Boston with his father Dec. 31 to see the NHL Winter Classic. Stories of dozens of other Canadian children with the same sorts of travel challenges soon emerged.
Within 60 days, the two countries plan to set up a Canada-U.S. Redress Working Group to help resolve errors of identity on no-fly lists. In a statement, Canada said the new processes would help expedite processing of complaints and streamline security-list removal procedures.
In addition, Canada and the U.S. will routinely share their respective no-fly lists as part of a joint effort to identify threats, something Goodale's office called "the first agreement of its kind" on such rosters.
"Both countries recognize the need for strong safeguards to protect privacy and personal information," said Scott Bardsley, a spokesman for Goodale.
The advice of the federal privacy commissioner's office "has been crucial during the development of the protocols with the U.S.," he added.
The commissioner's office had no immediate comment.
The two countries also announced Thursday they would move ahead with customs pre-clearance initiatives aimed at making border processing easier for low-risk travellers, and fulfil long-promised measures to keep closer track of when citizens cross the border.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and U.S. President Barack Obama discussed the projects during a news conference at the White House.
The pre-clearance arrangements, outlined in broad terms last year, would increase the American customs presence on Canadian soil and could see Canada one day establish similar operations in the United States.
Currently, passengers flying to American cities through eight major Canadian airports can be cleared there by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officers.
Pre-clearance will be expanded to Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport and Quebec City's Jean Lesage International Airport, as well as for rail service in Montreal and Vancouver. The U.S. Embassy in Ottawa said the plans were contingent upon ensuring recovery of costs to assign CBP officers at new Canadian locations.
The two countries will also implement long-planned systems to track border entry and exit information from travellers.
The measures -- almost two years behind schedule -- are intended in part to help stem the flow of foreign fighters to conflicts in the Middle East.
For the moment, the border tracking system -- promised in 2011 as part of the perimeter security pact -- involves exchanging entry information collected from people at the land border, so that data on entry to one country serves as a record of exit from the other.
The first two phases of the program have been limited to foreign nationals and permanent residents of Canada and the United States, but not citizens of either country.
The initiative was to be expanded by June 30, 2014, to include information-sharing on all travellers crossing the land border.
In addition, Canada had planned to begin collecting information on people leaving by plane -- something the United States already does -- by requiring airlines to submit passenger manifest data for outbound international flights.
