With the so-called Three Amigos summit this week in Ottawa and last weekâs shocking Brexit vote, Canadians seem to be less than thrilled with the North American Free Trade Agreement, a new poll finds.
Just one in four Canadians say 1993âs NAFTA deal linking Canada, the United States and Mexico has been a net benefit to this country, released Monday found.
Another 26 per cent of respondents say the deal has hurt Canada.
One-third of respondents say they want to see the deal renegotiated, while 24 per cent want it strengthened and expanded.
âIf you think about trade as a drawbridge, itâs not like Canadians want to blow up the bridge or pull it up,â Shachi Kurl, executive director of the Angus Reid Institute, said on ŰÎŰ´ŤĂ˝ Channel Monday. âBut they are questioning some of the rules around the traffic thatâs going back and forth and really pushing back against whether or not having that traffic coming back and forth over that bridge is a benefit to this country.â
While opinions on NAFTA may be mixed, the poll found 69 per cent of Canadians say the country should pursue closer ties with Mexico and 57 per cent said trade should be the countryâs top foreign policy priority.
In fact, Canadians have been relatively strongly supportive of the Canada-EU Trade Agreement and consistently say they support the Trans-Pacific Partnership. That deal, a 12-nation pact, is under close scrutiny by the U.S. Congress.
North American free trade has always been a contentious issue in Canada. In 1993, as the deal was being finalized, Angus Reid found 58 per cent of Canadians opposed it.
The latest poll found the largest proportion of respondents, at 27 per cent, say they donât know what the effect of the deal has been. Another 22 per cent said the deal has had no effect.
The belief that NAFTA has been a negative for Canada is strongest in Ontario and British Columbia. Alberta, Saskatchewan, Quebec and the Atlantic provinces had more respondents saying it had been a benefit.
Dissatisfaction with NAFTA is highest among older Canadians, which mirrors the results of the Brexit referendum in which almost 52 per cent of Britons voted to leave the European Union.
âAre we starting to see a pattern here? I think thatâs something to be watched,â said Kurl.