More than four in five Canadians want Canada’s border with the United States to stay closed and three quarters would not consider a day trip to the US this summer even if the border opens, a new poll has found.
Just one-in-five (19%) say the border should open when the current deadline for closure expires (June 21), while most look to either September (42%) or the end of the year (26%) for their preferred opening window, the latest study from the non-profit Angus Reid Institute finds[1]http://angusreid.org/covid19-canada-usa-border/.
When it comes to borders within this country, just one in five Canadians believe there should be free, unrestricted travel between provinces. The consensus among half (50%) is to stop short of total interprovincial restrictions but strongly discourage people from outside their own province from coming in, while one in three would restrict movement entirely to their own province.
The vast majority who live close to the Canada-U.S. border say they would definitely not (60%) or probably not (24%) take even a day trip south this summer even if the border were to open on June 21.
There are significant regional variations when it comes to opening the border with Canada’s southern neighbour.
Alberta leads the way with wanting to reopen the Canada-US border, with close to two in five residents saying June 21 is long enough (37%), followed by 26 in Saskatchewan and 21% in Manitoba. At the other end of the spectrum, less than one in eight residents in Atlantic Canada hold that view, followed by Quebec (16%) and Ontario(17%).
Opening the border with the United States also appears to be a partisan issue that also divides women and men.
There are two groups of people who are more likely than others to say the border should be opened after June 21 – men and those who voted for the Conservative Party in the last federal election. Men are twice as likely as women (26% to 13%) to say this, and CPC voters (35%) are at least four-times as likely to say this compared to past Liberal (9%) and NDP (7%) voters.
References [ + ]
| 1. | ↑ | http://angusreid.org/covid19-canada-usa-border/ |