Most Canadians say send Tamils home
Poll: Most say send Tamils home - Canada - Canoe.ca
Send them home and use the navy if necessary.
That's the message from Canadians in a new poll on the Tamil boat people.
By a margin of five to one, Canadians say the government should reject the almost 500 would-be refugees from Sri Lanka who arrived last week.
The Leger Marketing poll of 1,500 people, released exclusively to QMI Agency, was conducted Aug. 2-4 as the MV Sun Sea travelled toward the British Columbia coast.
Asked which statement best described their opinion on what should be done with the ship, which may include members of the banned Tamil Tiger terrorist group, 60% agreed with the statement: "They should be turned away -- the boat should be escorted back to Sri Lanka by the Canadian Navy."
Just 17% agreed with this statement: "They should be accepted into Canada as political refugees."
A significant number, 20%, said they did not know which answer to choose, while 4% did not answer.
Alberta ranked highest with 74% of respondents saying send back the boat and just 11% saying let them stay, while Quebec was the second highest with 64% opting to send back the boat and 15% saying the passengers should stay.
"That's a very high number (saying send back the boat)," said Leger pollster David Scholz.
He said it's likely high for a number of factors, including concerns about who arrived, such as possible terrorists, and whether other boats will follow.
"There is that worry that this is potentially people coming in, not just jumping the (refugee) queue, but coming in and falsely representing where they are from," said Scholz.
"We don't often hear about other refugee claims that are done on an individual or family basis, but when we see lots of them at the same time, we tend to get a little nervous."
Martin Collacott, Canada's highest-ranking diplomat in Sri Lanka when the civil war launched by the Tamil Tigers started in the early 1980s, said we can't just turn back the boat.
"We need to follow the process that takes the ones that are legitimate refugees and return the others," said Collacott.
How many are legitimate refugees is up for debate, said Collacott.
He noted that the MV Sun Sea didn't come directly from Sri Lanka, but from Thailand, where passengers were safe from any possible persecution from the Sri Lankan government.
As for what he takes away from the fact the majority of Canadians don't want the government to let the would-be refugees stay, Collacott pointed to a battered immigration system.
"I think it shos Canadians feel they are being taken advantage of," said Collacott.
The Canadian Tamil Congress believes that the poll results are a reflection of feelings toward the immigration system, not Tamils themselves.
"I think there is a growing frustration," said spokeswoman Manjula Selvarajah.
Still, Selvarajah put some of the blame on government rhetoric that has warned about possible criminal or terrorist connections on the boat.
"People may be reacting to certain words such as queue-jumpers and human smugglers," said Selvarajah. "If people understood the immigration and refugee system and the process in place, they may have a bit more faith in the system."
Pollster Scholz told QMI Agency that from the survey results, it's impossible to conclude whether race or ethnicity are factors in the negative reaction to the boat's arrival.
The poll of 1,500 adult Canadians was taken online between Aug. 2-4. A probability sample of the same size would yield a margin of error of plus or minus 2.5 percentage points.
