Canadians And The Children's Aid Society

Majority (61%) Give Positive Rating to Children's Aid Society But Significant Minority Say Children's Aid Society Does a Poor Job Protecting Children From Neglect and Abuse (30%) and Avoiding Unfair or Unjustified Interference in the Lives of Innocent Families (30%)
Toronto, ON - The results of an Ipsos-Reid/CTV poll released today show that although a majority (61%) say the Children's Aid Society does a good job, a sizeable minority of Canadians (30%) say that the Children's Aid Society does a poor job of protecting children from neglect and abuse. Furthermore, a similar number (31%) say that the Children's Aid Society does a poor job of avoiding unfair or unjustified interference in the lives of innocent families.

These are the findings of an Ipsos-Reid/CTV poll conducted between March 8th and March 10th, 2001. The poll is based on a randomly selected sample of 803 adult Canadians. With a sample of this size, the results are considered accurate to within 177 3.5 percentage points, 19 times out of 20, of what they would have been had the entire adult Canadian population been polled. The margin of error will be larger within regions and for other sub-groupings of the survey population. These data were statistically weighted to ensure the sample's regional and age/sex composition reflects that of the actual Canadian population according to the 1996 Census data.

Majority (61%) Give Positive Rating to Children's Aid Society But Significant Minority Say Children's Aid Society Does a Poor Job Protecting Children From Neglect and Abuse (30%) and Avoiding Unfair or Unjustified Interference in the Lives of Innocent Families (30%)

While a majority of Canadians (61%) say the Children's Aid Society is doing a good job, a sizeable minority (30%) think that the Children's Aid Society does a poor job of "protecting children from neglect and abuse". In fact, one in ten (9%) say that the Society does a "very poor job" this is almost double the percentage who say they do an "excellent job" (5%). Moreover, those who say the Society is doing a good job are not strong in their support, with most (56%) Canadians saying the Society does a "good job".

  • Women (34%) are more likely than men (27%) to say the Children's Aid Society does a poor job of protecting children.
  • Older (35%) and middle aged (33%) Canadians are more likely than younger Canadians (24%) to say the Children's Aid Society does a poor job.
  • Residents of B.C. (36%) and Saskatchewan/Manitoba (36%) are slightly more likely than other Canadians to say the Children's Aid Society is doing a poor job of protecting children.

In addition, there is also a sizeable minority who are critical of the Society's interference in the lives of innocent families. In all, three in ten (31%) Canadians say the Children's Aid Society does a poor job of "avoiding unfair or unjustified interference in the lives of innocent families". This includes 7% who say the Society does a "very poor job" of avoiding interfering with innocent families and a quarter (23%) who say the Society does a "poor job". In contrast, 56% say the Society does a "good job" but only 4% say it does an "excellent job" of avoiding interfering with innocent families.

  • Women (34%) are more likely than men (27%) to say that the Children's Aid Society does a poor job of avoiding interfering.
  • Older Canadians (39%) are much more likely than middle aged (32%) and younger (22%) Canadians to say the Society does a poor job of avoiding interfering with innocent families.
  • Residents of B.C. (40%) and Saskatchewan/Manitoba (38%) are slightly more likely than other Canadians to say the Children's Aid Society is doing a poor job of avoiding interfering.

For more information on this news release, please contact:

John Wright
Senior Vice President
Public Affairs
Ipsos-Reid
(416) 324-2900

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