When it comes to both views of the Chinese government and COVID-19, Chinese Canadians share similar concerns to everyone else
Recent events, such as the arrest of Huawei’s CFO Meng Wanzhou, the charges laid against the “two Michaels” in China, and the outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan have centered on Canada’s strained relationship with China and have often left Chinese Canadians feeling alienated from their fellow Canadians.
Today, the Canada Committee 100 Society (CCS100) and Innovative Research Group (INNOVATIVE) are releasing the results of a new survey of Chinese Canadians.
“There is a common conception that other Canadians see Chinese Canadians as spies for China, while others have said that Chinese immigrants are wealthy and are not facing the same hardships due to COVID-19,” said Guo Ding, Founding President of the Canada Committee 100 Society. In fact, the survey shows that on the issue of COVID-19, most Chinese Canadians perceive bias against their community among the media, with 52% saying the coverage has been biased against Chinese Canadians.
When it comes to the issues raised by CCS100, the survey shows things that are not as you might expect:
A majority of Chinese Canadians (53%) say that Canada cannot trust China in a dispute between the two countries. This is even higher among Chinese Canadians born in Canada (66%) or in Hong Kong or Taiwan (58%), but even among those born in Mainland China there’s an even split between high trust and low trust (46% each). 
On the issue of COVID-19, we actually see that Chinese Canadians have been harder hit than the general population. 23% of Canadians say they’ve had no negative financial impact from COVID, compared to just 14% among Chinese Canadians. Chinese Canadians are 9-points more likely to be worried about paying their mortgage, and 14-points more likely to be worried about paying rent. These gaps are even bigger among those with lower incomes and less education. 
The online survey was conducted among a representative sample of 579 Chinese Canadians, aged 18 and older, between June 17th and July 6th, 2020. Often, other surveys with a focus on Chinese Canadians are only conducted in English and French. However, this survey offered respondents the option to complete it in Traditional Chinese, Simplified Chinese, or English. This way, Chinese Canadians of various backgrounds were able to complete the survey. The results were weighted by key demographic and immigration attributes using the latest Statistics Canada Census data to reflect the actual demographic composition.
The study is reported on in national media outlets such as the CBC, and local news outlets such as Richmond News.
It is also reported on in many major Chinese media outlets in Canada, including Sing Tao, Ming Pao, OMNI TV, and Fairchild TV and Radio.
For detailed results, download our full report here.
Download our press release (in both English and Chinese) here.
