OTTAWA — A new poll suggests the vast majority of Canadians are proud of their home and native land, but our sense of national pride is lower than it was a few years ago. Polling firm Leger surveyed 1,607 people last weekend, asking how they're feeling about being Canadian ahead of Canada Day. The firm posed similar questions to a group of 1,003 Americans ahead of the Fourth of July.
The results suggest the vast majority of us — 76 per cent — would call ourselves proud Canadians. But 45 per cent of people who did the survey said they were feeling less proud than they did five years ago in 2019. Leger said that's up 16 percentage points from 2021, when they posed the same question.
Respondents were asked to choose from a list of things that make them most proud to be Canadian. The country's natural beauty topped the list, followed by universal health care, freedom and equality, a peaceful and safe society and multiculturalism. Just one in five said their fellow Canadians made them feel proud.
Long wait lists, lack of family doctors and overburdened emergency rooms that have made headlines across the country in recent years are taking a toll on our collective pride in medicare. The state of the health-care system was near the top of a list of concerns for respondents, second only to economic inequality and poverty as the thing that made people feel least proud to be Canadian. Coming in third on that list: the current federal government.
The vast majority of people who cho.
