Most Kingstonians want statue of Sir John A. Macdonald back: poll
Seven out of 10 Kingston, Ont., residents want their statue of Sir John A. Macdonald back, according to a new poll.
Authorities removed the statue of Canada’s first prime minister from a Kingston park in June 2021. That came after city council voted 12-1 to take his effigy down amid controversy over Macdonald’s role in creating the Indian Residential School system.
Mark O’Farrell, who chairs Kingston Friends of the Canadian Institute for Historical Education, was “pleasantly” surprised by the poll result.
“Kingston City Council, we are hoping, is going to put it to a vote,” O’Farrell said Monday.
“That will depend on what happens at the Kingston Heritage Properties Committee meeting on Wednesday morning.”
Kingston’s councillors were “misled” by city staffers in 2021 when they were told taking the statue down was legal, O’Farrell said.
“They specifically said ‘no’ beside the question: will this break any laws?”
But taking down the statue contravened the Ontario Heritage Act, he said. “A permit is required to remove anything within a heritage district…. They didn’t even apply for it.”
He’s hoping the heritage committee will send the issue back to city council.
“It should never have happened,” O’Farrell said of the 2021 vote to take down the Macdonald statue.
“There are checks and balances in place to make sure that people don’t act overzealously, and in this case, they did.”
Macdonald is responsible for co-founding Canada and creating the Canadian Pacific Railway, which united the new nation from coast to coast, O’Farrell said.
“He was the first prime minister of Canada, he was a Kingstonian,” O’Farrell said. “If any person deserves a statue in Kingston, it’s Sir John A. Macdonald.”
The decision to take the statue down came “after the Kamloops issue — everybody believed that there were 215 children buried in a mass grave and that it was all his fault,” O’Farrell said.
“That’s the most preposterous part of all of this — because the residential schools were not mandatory attendance until 21 years after he died. So, the idea of putting this on Sir John A. Macdonald is absolutely ridiculous.”
Fifty-nine per cent of those polled last month support restoring the statue to its former spot, and 12 per cent “somewhat support” its return, according to the poll commissioned by the Canadian Institute for Historical Education and conducted by Nanos Research.
Thirteen per cent of those polled oppose bringing Macdonald’s statue back. Seven per cent somewhat oppose the move, and nine per cent are unsure.
“As you may be aware, Sir John A. Macdonald was the Member of Parliament for Kingston and served as Canada’s first Prime Minister,” said the text read to those polled at the outset of the call.
“A statue of Sir John A. Macdonald was installed in City Park in Kingston in 1895. In June of 2021, the statue was removed by the municipal government from City Park. His reputation came into question when he was associated with Indian Residential Schools at a time when graves of Indigenous children (were) in the news. The statue of Sir John A Macdonald is currently stored in a warehouse, out of public display.”
Eighty-six per cent of the Kingston residents polled report being aware that Macdonald’s statue had been removed. Only 14 per cent of those polled didn’t know about the controversy.
According to the results, the older Kingstonians are, the more likely they are to be aware that Macdonald’s statue was removed.
For those between the ages of 18 and 35, 73 per cent knew about it. Among Kingstonians between the ages of 35 and 54, 86.9 per cent are in the same boat. And with those 55 or older, 94.2 per cent knew the statue came down.
Of those between the ages of 18 and 34, 27 per cent didn’t know about the controversy. Among those between 35 and 54, 13.1 per cent were not aware of the statue’s removal. Only 5.8 per cent of those 55 plus didn’t know about it.
Men are more likely to get behind the statue’s restoration than women, with 66.8 per cent of them indicating they support its return and 8.1 per cent saying they somewhat support it.
Just over half (51.5 per cent) of women support the return of the statue, and 15.1 per cent somewhat support it.
When questioned about why they think the statue should be restored, 18.1 per cent of people who held that opinion said it’s because they want to preserve history. Another 13.2 per cent noted Macdonald’s historical significance.
Just over 12 per cent of those polled said they believe in learning from history, and 7.2 per cent cited the “inappropriateness of judging historical figures by modern standards.”
Most respondents (81.9 per cent) said it’s important for Kingstonians to recognize their history in public spaces. Those who had a neutral opinion on the matter made up 13.2 per cent of those polled. Three per cent indicated it’s not important and 1.9 per cent weren’t sure.
When asked whether it’s important that Kingstonians learn more about the legacy of Canada’s first prime minister, including his accomplishments as a founder of Canada and his role in the Indian Residential School system, 78.2 per cent of respondents indicated it was important, 13.9 per cent were neutral, five per cent said it wasn’t important and 2.9 per cent were unsure.
If the push to get the statue restored is successful, O’Farrell doesn’t know when it might go back up.
“We’d love to see it happen on Canada Day. That would be really timely and highly appropriate. But we don’t even know if we’re going to get to council yet, and we won’t know that until at least Wednesday.”
Nanos Research conducted the random telephone survey of 305 Kingstonians aged 18 and older between Feb. 3 and 6. The margin of error is plus or minus 5.7 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.
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