Survey also shines light on voting intentions
A new Leger poll has revealed that a majority of Canadians believe higher immigration has worsened the national housing crisis and put further pressure on the healthcare system.
About three-quarters of the poll’s respondents agreed that an increasing number of immigrants contributed to strain on the housing market and the healthcare system. Around 63% also said that the large number of newcomers added to the pressure of Canada’s educational systems.
Still, about three-quarters of respondents said a higher number of immigrants contributed to the cultural diversity of the country. About 63% of respondents noted how the arrival of younger immigrants contributed to the workforce and the tax base which supported the older generations.
Compared to the findings in March 2022, there was a significant decrease in the number of Canadians who wanted the country to welcome more immigrants, with that figure falling from 17% to about 9%. About 48% of the respondents said that Canada should welcome a lower number of immigrants, compared with 39% before.
Christian Bourque, the executive vice president of Leger, noted that there were more Canadians who correlated immigration with problems like housing affordability.
About 53% of survey respondents said that the 485,000 and 500,000 targets for immigration in 2024 and 2025 respectively were too high.
Marc Miller, the federal immigration minister, has recently said that targets for new permanent resident arrivals will be held at 500,000 in 2026.
The Leger poll also found that the Conservatives maintained their lead over the Liberals when it comes to the federal voting intention numbers. About 40% of the respondents said that they were most likely to vote for Pierre Poilievre’s Conservatives while 26% intended to vote for Liberals and 20% will vote for the NDP.
Bourque said that lower support for the current leaders suggested that the issue concerning leadership may became a point of focus when it comes to federal politics.
“We're seeing that... all leaders are underperforming (their parties). Which begs the question: will this all be about leadership moving forward?” said Bourque.
The Leger poll involved 1,529 Canadian respondents online. Notably, the results cannot be assigned a margin of error because online polls were not considered to have truly random samples.
