Canadians polled on global warming treaty

Dec. 10, 2009, Winnipeg – The Frontier Centre for Public Policy has released a
COMPAS poll showing that most Canadians prefer to hold off on signing a global
warming treaty in Copenhagen. The reasons include concern over the economy and
doubts about the objectivity of the science.

In practice, 14% of Canadians oppose signing such a treaty under any circumstance.
In contrast, only 25% favour going ahead with it. The largest cluster (51%)
favours postponement of signing, either until there is more confidence that the
global economy is coming out of recession (25%) or until there is strong
agreement that the scientific research attributing climate change to humans is
fully objective (26%). Eleven percent had no opinion. Thus, among Canadians who
had an opinion on the issue, 73% favour postponing a decision or not signing at
all, whereas 28% advocate signing a treaty at Copenhagen.

“Some doubt about when the global economy will recover from the recession and some
doubt about the scientific arguments behind the push for a treaty on global
warming are the chief drivers in causing Canadians to want the federal
government to postpone signing a treaty,” observed Conrad Winn, president of
COMPAS and principal investigator on the poll.

The poll was conducted across Canada on 28 November 2009. The sample size was 1,000
and is deemed accurate to within approximately three percentage points, 19
times out of 20.