Poll: Majority of Canadians Reject Foreign Investment
Canadians should stop hiding behind the maple leaf. Canada needs foreign investment, wherever it comes from. But, it will be years before the distrust of foreign state corporations, notably Chinese, will begin to ease. A lot of it pins on how CNOOC behaves in the coming years.
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Most Canadians want the Harper government to stop the sale of Canadian companies to foreign investors, particularly if the buyer is a state-owned enterprise, a new poll has found.
The Ipsos Reid survey, conducted exclusively for Postmedia News and Global TV, found that 68 per cent of Canadians believe the Conservative government should block the sale of Canadian firms to “all foreign investors.”
Moreover, 74 per cent of Canadians say the governing Tories should stop such proposed acquisitions if they are made by state-owned enterprises owned by a foreign government.
The poll also cast a fresh light on public attitudes towards Canada’s international trade agenda. Most Canadians (61 per cent) support the idea of increasing trade with Asia — a key element of the federal government’s economic plan.
However, there is a note of caution among Canadians about doing business with China. Prime Minister Stephen Harper travelled to that country earlier this year and there has been preliminary discussion about launching talks for a free-trade deal.
But a majority of Canadians (59 per cent) say they oppose a free-trade agreement with China that would be similar to the one struck with the United States 25 years ago.
The nationwide survey comes after Harper announced earlier this month his government will allow the $15.1-billion takeover of Nexen by a Chinese state-owned enterprise, but that future sales of this type in the Canadian oil patch will only occur under “exceptional” circumstances.
Advocates of outside investment in Canada’s oil industry say the input of foreign capital is needed to pump billions of dollars into projects.
However, the new poll found that most Canadians (56 per cent) disagreed with the statement that “if Canada wants its oil and gas sector to grow, it needs to attract foreign investment from countries like China.”
While the poll found majority support (61 per cent) for enhanced trade to Asia, the support drops for specific countries: India (56 per cent) and China (51 per cent).
The results are from a poll conducted Dec. 7 to 12. For the survey, a sample of 1,021 Canadians from Ipsos’s Canadian online panel was interviewed online.
The margin of error is considered to be 3.5 percentage points.
– Vancouver Sun