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Last week, TIAO and our tourism delegation met with cabinet ministers and their teams in person at the 2022 conference of the Association of Municipalities Ontario (AMO) in Ottawa. This was an important opportunity to advocate on behalf of Ontario’s tourism industry by bringing key issues and recommendations to ministry teams, gauging the policy priorities of key ministries to incorporate into future advocacy, and fostering working relationships with key ministry officials and staff.  

Joining us as part of our tourism delegation were Destination Northern Ontario, Indigenous Tourism Ontario, OTEC, Boating Ontario, OMCA, Camping in Ontario, Smart Serve, RTO9, Kingston Accommodation Partners, and Blue Mountain Village Association.   

Our key AMO asks included: debt relief and action on commercial insurance, implementing a tourism workforce strategy, new tax incentives and partnerships to spur tourism growth, creating regional and localized solutions to the affordable housing crisis, continued transportation and infrastructure upgrades, climate change prevention and recovery supports, and long-term strategic investments to support the rebuild, growth, and resilience of our industry across tourism sectors and regions.   

With our tourism delegation, TIAO met with 17 ministries including the Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Sport; Ministry of Labour, Immigration, Training and Skills Development; Treasury Board Secretariat; Ministry of Northern Development; Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry; Ministry of Indigenous Affairs; Ministry of Transportation; Ministry of Francophone Affairs; and the Ministry of Environment, Conservation and Parks.  

We met with MPP Mike Schreiner, leader of the Green Party of Ontario, and we also met with Mayor Cam Guthrie, chair of the Ontario Big City Mayors (OBCM). In our discussion with Mayor Guthrie, we discussed the impacts of rising visible homelessness and precarity on the safety of frontline tourism workers – and how TIAO can help advocate for the provincial resources that municipalities need to address this complex issue. 

But that’s not all – we continued to raise awareness of the challenges facing tourism recovery at the TIAO booth in the AMO exhibition hall. TIAO met with various Mayors, Deputy Mayors, economic developer’s, CAO’s, councilors, and other regional organization leaders. We discussed the economic impact of tourism within their municipality and how we can work together to support the tourism industry. 

After flagging our key asks at AMO, we will be pursuing follow-up meetings with ministries and municipal partners to discuss these issues and our recommendations in greater depth to support the rebuilding of Ontario’s tourism industry across all sectors and regions of the province. 

As always, thank you for your continued support. And of course, if you have any questions or comments, please feel free to send me an email at jng@tiaontario.ca 

Jessica Ng

Director, Policy & Government Affairs

This week, we submitted TIAO’s contribution to the Federal Tourism Growth Strategy. Our contribution addressed the consultation’s focus areas—labour gaps and instability, investment attraction and destination development, and long-term economic growth across the country—through the lens of four critical themes: economic, labour, infrastructure, and sustainable tourism.  

Our overarching message was that in order for tourism businesses to fully leverage the opportunities for growth and prosperity and in order for the industry to move forward, there are still a number of barriers to overcome first—with many of these barriers producing an uneven pace of recovery for tourism sectors and regions across the province. Addressing these immediate and systemic economic, labour, infrastructure, and sustainability barriers will help ensure that tourism businesses fully recover from the effects of the past two years and can be in a position to cultivate economic growth over the long-term.  

As such, we called for:  

• Debt relief measures
• Tax and financial incentives to support the return of meetings, conventions, events, and live entertainment
• A Tourism Workforce Strategy with measures to promote tourism as a career, immigration reform to attract and retain talent of all skill levels, investments in future talent, and ensuring workforce decision-making is data-driven, locally-, and regionally-specific   
• Investing in bus and passenger rail links to connect rural destinations
• Mandates to ensure the building of more affordable housing purchases, including purpose-built rentals
• Climate change prevention and mitigation supports for resource-based tourism operators  
• Permanent personal income tax credits to incentivize domestic travel over the long-term
• Strategies to ensure future seamless inbound travel for US visitors  

To read our full list of recommendations, click here for our submission and here to read TIAC’s submission.

Over the past two weeks, we’ve also made a number of media appearances discussing the Ontario Staycation Tax Credit, ArriveCAN issues, what’s behind the delays at Toronto Pearson airport, and the impact of travel barriers on visitors.  

As always, thank you for your continued support. And of course, if you have any questions or comments, please feel free to send me an email at jng@tiaontario.ca.




Dr. Jessica Ng, PhD

Director, Policy & Government Affairs