Majority of Canadians for banning Chinese investment in telecom amid Huawei row

A strong majority of Canadians say the country should ban Chinese investment in “sensitive industries” like telecommunications, according to a new poll by the Angus Reid Institute that focuses on the diplomatic spat stirred up between Canada and China over the arrest of Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd CFO Meng Wanzhou and detention of Canadians in China. About 70 per cent of Canadians polled online said China shouldn’t be allowed to invest in Canada’s telecom or finance industries, while 66 per cent said Canadian consumers should try to avoid buying things made in China right now. It comes as the Canadian government deals with international and domestic political pressure to ban Huawei technology from telecom companies’ 5G networks. Other recent polling has suggested Canadians favour a ban, but federal cabinet has said it won’t rush a decision or bow to the intensifying political pressure. Only a third of the Angus Reid survey respondents think Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is handling the diplomatic conflict with China well, while half say he is doing a poor job. Even among Liberal voters, only 14 per cent think his government is doing a “very good job” stickhandling the matter. Forty-four per cent said the Liberal government is not being tough enough and needs to take stronger action, while nearly 29 per cent said the government’s response has been appropriate. Six per cent said Trudeau is being “too tough.” Just slightly over half said arresting Meng was the right decision. The results are from an online survey fielded from Jan. 23 to 28, taken from a representative sample of 1,700 Canadian adults. Because it’s an online panel poll, it does not come with margin of error. The U.S. recently filed a spate of criminal charges against Huawei in two separate cases, ranging from obstruction of justice to bank and wire fraud. One indictment claims the company violated Iran sanctions through using a shell company, while the other alleges it stole trade secrets from T-Mobile US Inc., citing employee email conversations about copying a phone-testing robot arm called “Tappy.” Meng faces charges in one of the cases. Huawei has denied the allegations. U.S. President Donald Trump has tied Meng’s extradition case directly to politics by suggesting he might intervene if it means a better outcome for the U.S. in trade with China or national security, while the Trudeau government has said Canadian law enforcement arrested Meng only because Canada follows the rule of law. Nine-in-ten Canadians said diplomatic tensions between Canada and China are either “very serious” or “quite serious,” but most of those sampled in the survey, 65 per cent, said they think once the Huawei spat blows over, relations with China will return to normal.

Majority of Canadians for banning Chinese investment in telecom amid Huawei row

Brief | February 1, 2019

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Majority of Canadians for banning Chinese investment in telecom amid Huawei row

Brief | February 1, 2019

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