Ontario Construction News staff writer

Canadians are increasingly pessimistic about the future state of the country’s infrastructure, given the country’s booming population and staggering demands for new housing, according to a new survey.

Sixty-three per cent are also not confident governments alone can cover the costs of building and maintaining new and upgraded infrastructure required to handle that growth without raising taxes.

The results of the poll, conducted by Abacus Data in late September on behalf of CCPPP, were released this morning at P3 2024, Canada’s Infrastructure Conference which attracted about 900 Canadian and international delegates.

“Canadians clearly see trouble on the horizon for our country’s infrastructure,” said CCPPP’s president and CEO Lisa Mitchell. “Still suffering from the effects of inflation and its daily hits on their household budgets, they’re also open to governments taking a more pragmatic approach to this challenge.

“That’s why there is broad support across all regions, demographics and political parties for governments to partner with the private sector to help shoulder the load and share these financial costs and risks,” she said.

The polling results back up recommendations made in recent policy and research reports by CCPPP (Modernizing Canada’s Approach to P3s and Empowering Municipalities: Unlocking the Potential of P3s), calling on governments to make greater use of private finance via P3s to stretch scarce tax dollars further to deliver the critical infrastructure and services Canadians need.

“The survey results demonstrate Canadians strongly prefer P3s in practice. This cuts across all regions, political parties and even generations, from Gen Z to the Boomers,” Mitchell said. “This is a message our politicians, government officials, the media and the public need to hear. We cannot bridge this country’s infrastructure gap, improve the lives of Canadians or grow our economy without the public and private sectors working together to find solutions.

The Abacus Data survey findings include:

• Only 31 per cent of Canadians rate the current state of publicly-owned infrastructure assets in their communities in good or excellent condition. These assets range from roads and hospitals to water/wastewater systems and community rec facilities.
• 88 per cent are very pessimistic about Canada’s infrastructure in the near future, stating they agree it will deteriorate and require significant repairs and upgrades.
• 92 per cent stated they believe our rapidly growing population will increase the demand for new and improved public infrastructure.
• 63 per cent are not confident governments can cover the costs of building and maintaining that new and upgraded infrastructure without raising taxes. This confidence is particularly low for those who already believe infrastructure is failing: Older Canadians, women, Conservative and NDP voters, and those who live in rural areas.
• 47 per cent prefer government sharing the financial cost and risk of infrastructure  with private companies, 24 per cent prefer government going it alone, while 29 per cent have no preference/aren’t sure.
• Liberal, Conservative and NDP voters all prefer government sharing financial cost and risk with private companies  (Liberal: 48 per cent, Conservative: 49 per cent, and NDP: 52 per cent)
• 49 per cent support the use of public-private partnerships to build, fund, operate and maintain public infrastructure and that number jumps to 60 per cent when described as using a combination of government and private investment and other resources.

“A scarcity mindset is now common among most Canadians who are seeing the effect of rapid population growth without much improvement in the infrastructure and services they rely on,” said Abacus Data Founder and CEO, David Coletto. “Building the infrastructure Canadians need to live their lives and prosper will be a major pressure point in our politics and society for the next decade.”