Toronto – A new survey shows that more than half of Canadians believe that they did not have enough information to cast their ballots in the last federal election or they needed more.
IPSOS Pols say 57 percent of respondents believe that they did not have enough local news or could use more to assess candidates in April.
Many respondents pointed at social media as their most influential news sources, with 14 percent of the social media site, especially the social media site, banned news materials in Canada.
The online survey of 1,000 Canadian residents was conducted from 11 to 21 July and is part of a study by the Public Policy Forum on access to local news.
Think tank concluded that a stable erosion of local news outlets is “taken through toxic water of many Canadian people.”
Report writers include former Toronto star columnist Tim Harper and former McLeen Editor Editor Alison Chacha, who suggests that a permanent non-partitive election funds can help media outlets cover the better political race.
The report said, “Covered coverage with candidates using their social media channels at the local level, rather filtered their information through local journalists,” the report said that the public policy forum has also been called co-author by the academy’s executive director and previous radio-Canada journalist Sara Christine Jameson.
“There is no hyperbole to argue that, given the collapse of local news and the Facebook ban on news on its site, the federal election of 2025 was the most likely for the worst covered election in modern Canadian history.”
Meta stopped Canadian access to news on Facebook and Instagram in 2023, when the federal government required social media to pay Canadian news outlets to post its journalism.
Senior VP Sean Simpson of Ipsos says the pole shows that “people are getting more information about their local candidates and local issues”.
The poll found that 70 percent of the respondents said that the greater availability of local news would have made him a better informed voter.
There were some overlaps when the respondents were asked which sources of information had the most impact on their ballot, the most often cited 46 percent with the national media, followed by the Word-off-Mouth 35 percent.
While 14 percent pointed to Facebook, 15 percent cited other social media, such as Tiktok, Reddit and Instagram.
Simpson noted that national concerns dominated the campaign as concerns over the economic policies of US President Donald Trump, which shaped a two-party breed and Liberal leader Mark Carney between Conservative leader Pierre Polyvere.
“It was contested on national leaders,” says Simpson, “Simpson says, reached Kitchenar, Onts.
“This was: Who is the best to deal with Trump?”
“Exposed: How to build back election coverage for a better democracy” is scheduled for release on Thursday.
