By Natalie Winkler
This year, the Ottawa Tourism and Convention Authority is predicting a 15-per-cent decrease in overnight bus tourism.
The drop is being linked to foreign companies that refuse to hire local tour guides. By only using their guides, these companies are able to tour Ottawa in just a couple of hours instead of a couple of days, said Dawn Murray, manager of media relations for the Ottawa Tourism and Convention Authority.
Unlike Washington and Montreal, the city of Ottawa has no bylaw to protect their local guides. Under Canada’s Immigration Act, bus companies touring Ottawa have the freedom to use their own guides.
For the past decade, Leonor Léon has been fighting to save her profession. Léon, 58, has been working as a bus tour guide, operator and director for 24 years.
“I call these companies pirates because they come here and they do our job,” said Léon, president of the Capital Region Tour Guide Association and founder of Rosita’s Ottawa City Tours.
Léon said foreign companies usually only hire local guides for the first trip so they can record what the guide says and then use the information. These foreign companies are usually from other provinces, the United States, Europe, or Japan.
“They do not know any details about the city. All they have is stolen information,” said Léon as she clenched her fists.
Close to 100 local people work as step-on-guides in the Ottawa area. With no protection in place, Léon said these guides cannot expect to pay their bills by working in their profession.
Léon is fighting for a bylaw that will force these companies to hire only local guides. However, Murray warns that a bylaw may not be the answer.
“Niagara Falls tried it and the companies boycotted going there,” said Murray.
The Capital Region Tour Guide Association has also been asking for official guide certification. This November, Algonquin College will be offering a step-on-guide course. The course will officially certify guides and increase their chances of being hired by foreign companies, said Paula Kerr, co-ordinator of the course.
“The tourism industry will benefit because the city will be presented in a better educated light,” said Kerr.
Close to six million tourists visited the National Capital Region last year, creating about $1 billion in economic activity. However, local bus companies say they are still losing money.
“If only half of the foreign companies took on local guides, we would increase our profits by 40 to 50 per cent,” said Alain Paquette, director of ABC Tours in Ottawa.
Regional Coun. Richard Cantin disagrees with a bylaw forcing companies to hire local guides. Cantin said the bylaw would prevent the best qualified guide from conducting the tours, and it would only “implement a local tour guide monopoly.”