Toronto's 2008 Olympic Bid

Toronto, ON - The results of an Ipsos-Reid/CTV poll released today show that as the IOC wrapped up its visit to Toronto last week, three-quarters (73%) of Canadians are in favour of Toronto hosting the 2008 Summer Olympics. However, even though support for the Olympics is strong, a majority (55%) are opposed to the government spending taxpayers' money to help with the bid.

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.

Three-Quarters (73%) of Canadians are in Favour of Toronto Hosting the 2008 Summer Olympics

A large majority (73%) of Canadians say that they are in favour of Toronto hosting the 2008 Summer Olympics. There is also a great deal of intensity behind the support, with 43 percent of Canadians who are "strongly in favour" and another three-in-ten (30%) who are "somewhat in favour". Only one-in-five (21%) say they are opposed to Toronto hosting the Olympics, with 13 percent who "strongly oppose" the initiative and 8 percent who "somewhat oppose" it.

• Interestingly, Ontarians (64%) are least likely to support Toronto hosting the Olympics while Atlantic Canadians (88%) and Albertans (87%) are most likely to say they support Toronto hosting the Olympics.
• Younger (75%) and middle aged (77%) Canadians are more likely than older Canadians (66%) to say they support Toronto hosting the Olympics.

But Majority (55%) Oppose Spending Taxpayers' Money to Help With the Bid

Although there is considerable support for Toronto hosting the 2008 Olympics, a majority (55%) of Canadians say they oppose the government spending taxpayers' money to help with Toronto's Olympic bid. This includes more than one-third (35%) who "strongly oppose" the use of taxpayer money and one-in-five (20%) who "somewhat oppose". In contrast, 44 percent of Canadians favour the use of government money, with 16 percent who "strongly favour" and three-in-ten (29%) who "somewhat favour" the use of government money.

• Canadians with a high school education or less (58%) are more likely to oppose the use of government money than Canadians with a university education (49%).
• Canadians earning less than $60,000 per year (57%) are more likely to oppose using taxpayers' money for the bid than those earning $60,000 or more per year (50%).

For more information on this news release, please contact:

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