Trudeau hugely unpopular with Gen Z voters despite pandering to them

Even as Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his Liberal government seek to attract Gen Z voters with a budget that spoke of “generation fairness” and offered $8.5 billion to build new housing, younger voters are abandoning the Trudeau government in droves.

According to a recent poll from the Angus Reid Institute, 70 percent of Gen Z (aged 18-24) and Millennial (aged 25-44) voters have lost confidence in the federal government to represent their interests. That’s consistent with other age groups who have also lost patience with Trudeau.

After Trudeau plunged the nation into another $40 billion of debt, the poll revealed that 28 percent of Canadians believe the federal government’s deficit spending is the number on concern – double from what it was in a similar survey one year ago.

Canadians are also focusing on different issues as their chief concerns. Climate change is not one of them. Of those responding to Angus Reid, 51 percent cited the cost of living as their most important issue.

Only 10 percent of Gen Z respondents said Trudeau was the best choice for prime minister, behind Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre at 25 percent, New Democratic Party leader Jagmeet Sinhg at 23 percent and none of the above at 21 percent.

Of those surveyed, 28 percent said Poilievre could best handle the health care file, twice as many as the 14 percent who said Trudeau was the best choice. Singh finished second with 22 percent while 22 percent also indicated that no one listed was up to managing health care.

Even though much of Trudeau’s budget promised to fight the housing crisis in Canada and to provide affordable homes, Poilievre beat Trudeau 31 percent to 13 percent in this category, with Singh in between at 19 percent.

Trudeau’s numbers are actually worse on housing among Gen Z and Millennial voters with less than one in ten expressing confidence in Trudeau.

The Angus Reid Institute survey was completed online from Apr. 19-23, 2024 with a a “representative randomized sample” of 3,015 Canadian adults who are members of Angus Reid Forum. The poll has a margin of error of +/- 2 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

In another poll by Angus Reid released Wednesday, those surveyed indicated that they were not impressed with Finance Minister Chrystia Feeland’s budget, which appears to be having absolutely no impact on the Liberal Party’s standing in the polls ahead of the next federal election.

Respondents said they would be voting Conservative over Liberal by a margin of 43 percent to 23 percent. Gen Z respondents also placed the Liberals as their third electoral choice, after the CPC and NDP.

Meanwhile, half (47 percent) of Canadians say they are more pessimistic about the future of their personal financial situation, and a majority (56 percent) say their outlook for Canada’s economy has grown more negative in the wake of the budget.

The poll was conducted from Apr. 19-23, 2024 with 3,015 Canadian adults and has a margin of error of +/- 2 percentage points, 19 times out of 20. Discrepancies in or between totals are due to rounding. The survey was self-commissioned and paid for by ARI.

In an Ipsos poll released last week, 28 percent of those surveyed had no opinion at all about the budget, of those who did, 40 percent gave Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland’s budget of $52.9 million in new spending a “thumbs down.”

Another 43 percent described themselves as neutral. Only 17 percent of those polled expressed satisfaction with the budget, giving it a “thumbs up.”

The Liberals plan to pay for a portion of this plan by heaping more taxes on the rich, including higher capital gains taxes. However, Freeland's definition of the rich would seem to include many Canadians whose primary asset are their homes and real estate. The budget document notes that the government is increasing the tax to 66.7 percent on capital gains over $250,000, up from the current 50 percent.