In the wake of reports about China’s interference activities in Canada, few in the country see the communist regime in a favourable light, with most regarding it as either a threat or an enemy, according to an Angus Reid Institute
survey.
Among 1,622 Canadian adults surveyed, the majority (62 percent, or over three in five) said the federal government should regard Beijing as either a threat to Canadian interests (40 percent) or an enemy (22 percent). Only 6 percent said the regime should be approached on friendly terms.
China was one of six countries explored in the survey published March 10, with the other five being the United States, Mexico, Taiwan, India, and Russia. Of the six countries, only Russia generated a more hostile response than China, with 72 percent of Canadians seeing it as either a threat or an enemy. The pollster points to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as having “created a clear fracture line in international relations in what has increasingly become a world divided between
two superpowers, China and the United States.”
China fostered the increased distrust among Canadians with alleged foreign interference that ranged from meddling in the
2019 and 2022 federal elections to launching a
surveillance balloon that violated Canadian airspace to creating
secret police stations on Canadian soil.
Election Interference
As more details emerge in
allegations of China’s potential election interference, reportedly aimed in part to crush Conservative Party candidates deemed unfriendly to Beijing, the poll shows that the vast majority of past Conservative voters (88 percent) either hold “very unfavourable” views of China (60 percent, or three in five) or “mostly unfavourable” views (28 percent).
Not only past Conservative voters, but the majority of past voters of each of the other major political parties surveyed also view China either very or mostly unfavourably—87 percent of Bloc Québécois voters, 83 percent of Liberal voters, and 79 percent of NDP voters.
While 74 percent of past Conservative voters say China is a threat to or an enemy of Canada, the figures are 61 percent of past Liberal voters, 57 percent of past Bloc Québécois voters, and 56 percent of past NDP voters.
In
an earlier Angus Reid Institute survey, published March 1, most adult Canadians expressed belief that China did try to interference in the 2019 and 2021 federal elections, with two-thirds (32 percent) saying Beijing “definitely” tried and another two-thirds (33 percent) said it “probably” tried.
As recently as 2017, almost half (48 percent) of Canadians held favourable views of China, said Angus Reid. But that opinion started to turn sour and has never recovered since China’s detention of Canadian citizens
Michael Spavor and Michael Kovrig in December 2018, in what was widely seen as “
hostage diplomacy“ in retaliation for Canada’s arrest of Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou.
“Though that matter resolved with the
two Michaels’ release after more than 1,000 days in Chinese prison, recent events have apparently done little to elevate Canadian opinion,” the pollsters said .
“Perhaps related to Canadians’ negative views of China, Taiwan is held in high regard by a majority of Canadians,” the pollsters added. The self-ruled island, Canada’s
13th-largest trading partner, is seen favourably by 62 percent of Canadians, with 51 percent viewing it “mostly” favourably and 11 percent “very” favourably.
The March 10 Angus Reid survey was conducted online between Feb. 23 and 25 among a representative randomized sample of 1,622 Canadian adults who are members of the Angus Reid Forum. A probability sample of this size would carry a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.
