Vaccine Mandates Caused Loss of Trust in Feds, Internal Polling Shows

Health Minister Jean-Yves Duclos makes an announcement on ending vaccine mandates for domestic travellers, transportation workers, and federal employees, in Ottawa on June 14, 2022. The Canadian Press/Patrick Doyle

Internal polling conducted days before Ottawa announced it would suspend the vaccine mandates suggested the mandates were unpopular and caused a loss of “trust” in the federal government.

Vaccine mandates “represented overreach on the part of the federal government and unfairly infringed upon those who made the personal choice to not get vaccinated for Covid-19,” respondents told the Strategic Counsel, according to Blacklock’s Reporter.

“As a result of this some felt they had lost their sense of trust in the federal government.”

The results of the survey were published in a May 16 report titled “Continuous Qualitative Data Collection Of Canadians’ Views,” produced by the Strategic Counsel for the Privy Council Office. Data was gathered through focus groups across the country.

“Several felt the federal approach had lost direction as the government continued to implement public health measures and requirements that participants felt were no longer effective in curbing the spread of Covid-19,” says the report.

Provinces and territories began lifting restrictions such as vaccine passports during the winter, but Ottawa took a more cautious approach.

The Liberal government announced on June 14 that the vaccine mandates for domestic travel and the federally regulated workforce would be lifted starting June 20.

Ottawa chose not to renew the interim orders implementing the measure, allowing them to lapse, but it emphasized in public communications that the mandates were merely suspended and could be brought back if deemed necessary.

“While the suspension of vaccine mandates reflects an improved public health situation in Canada, the COVID-19 virus continues to evolve and circulate in Canada and globally,” said Health Minister Jean-Yves Duclos in a statement.

“The science is also perfectly clear on one thing: vaccination remains the single most effective way to protect ourselves, our families, our communities, and our economy against COVID-19.”

No Recommendation

Legal proceedings related to four lawsuits challenging the travel vaccine mandate have revealed a trove of information on why and how the policy was crafted and implemented.

Testimony from government witnesses during cross-examination revealed that Health Canada never made a direct recommendation for a travel vaccine mandate, and the mandate was supported by limited data on in-flight viral transmission—a risk the government otherwise assessed as “low.”

Using a vaccine mandate to prevent infection in the transportation sector and increase vaccine uptake in the general population were the two main objectives of the government, according to internal documents revealed during legal proceedings.

The government knew in late 2021/early 2022 that vaccines had reduced effectiveness against infection, according to Dr. Eleni Galanis, director general of the Centre for Integrated Risk Assessment at the Public Health Agency of Canada, during cross-examination in June. It had data showing COVID-19 injections provided protection of “20 percent or less” six months after vaccination.

The mandates that came into force in October 2021 were kept in place until June 20, which according to the Strategic Counsel’s research was unpopular.

“All participants were of the view vaccine requirements had been largely harmful, believing they had been divisive, ineffective and unfairly targeted those who had made the personal decision to not get vaccinated,” says the report.

“It was primarily felt the decision to get vaccinated was a personal one and given the perception that vaccinated and non-vaccinated individuals can both transmit the virus, it was felt this did not make much of a difference regarding the level of safety of those who were not fully vaccinated.”

Other Polling

Other polling available to the government regarding mandates did not show such a strong opposition to vaccine mandates, but still suggested popular support was dropping.

A briefing provided to cabinet days before the decision was made to suspend the mandates cited polling from EKOS from early May. The heavily-redacted briefing was partly declassified during proceedings for the travel mandate lawsuits.

“Public support for continued use of vaccine passports for travel and public events has decreased from a high of 74% in December 2021, to a majority of Canadians (58%) in May 2022 (29% opposed, 13% neither),” says the briefing.

The same briefing echoed complaints made publicly by travel operators at the time, who called for the lifting of travel restrictions.

The briefing says operators were reporting “acute challenges in staffing critical positions across sectors, citing current vaccination mandate as key factor.”

This work-related concern was also noted in the research conducted by the Strategic Counsel.

“A few also felt those who lost their jobs due to lack of compliance with federal vaccine mandates had been unfairly treated by the Government of Canada, believing individuals’ careers should not have been impacted by what they perceived to be personal health decisions,” said the report.

Ottawa abandoned its last vaccine mandate on Oct. 1, which applied to unvaccinated travellers entering Canada. Unvaccinated foreigners can now enter the country, and unvaccinated Canadians can re-enter without having to test or quarantine for 14 days.