55% of Manitobans want more indigenous say in CFS: Vote Compass

More than half—55 per cent—of Manitobans believe indigenous peoples should have a greater say in child welfare services for indigenous youth, according to new findings from Vote Compass.

The findings are based on 9,552 respondents who participated in Vote Compass from March 15 to April 5, 2016.

• CBC Manitoba Vote Compass

Manitoba has more than 10,000 children and youth in the care of Child and Family Services (CFS) and the vast majority are indigenous.

In response, the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs created a First Nations child advocate position in 2015 to lobby on behalf of indigenous children in care.

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"While a majority of Manitobans think Aboriginal Peoples should have more of a say in child welfare services for aboriginal youth, support is chiefly concentrated among NDP, Green and Liberal voters," noted Gregory Kerr, research manager with Vox Pop Labs, the creator of Vote Compass.

"PC voters, for their part, are split on this issue, despite the fact that the PC leadership has repeatedly spoken out in support of Aboriginal Peoples having a greater say in these matters," he said.

Another topic Vote Compass explored in the most recent report was flood protection for First Nations. The Vote Compass data show 51 per cent of Manitobans support more funding to protect First Nation communities from rising waters.

Kerr said support for funding flood prevention also revealed nuances in party support.

"The data reveal a similar trend with regard to public support for flood protection for aboriginal communities," he said.

"With over 65 per cent of NDP, Green and Liberal voters voicing support for increased public spending on flood protection measures, against only 34% of PC voters, the largest proportion of whom (40%) indicate that they are happy with the current level of expenditure," said Kerr.

Developed by a team of social and statistical scientists from Vox Pop Labs, Vote Compass is a civic engagement application offered in Canada exclusively by CBC News.

The findings are based on 9,552 respondents who participated in Vote Compass from March 15 to April 5, 2016. Unlike online opinion polls, respondents to Vote Compass are not pre-selected.

Similar to opinion polls, however, the data are a non-random sample from the population and have been weight- ed in order to approximate a representative sample.

Vote Compass data have been weighted by geography, gender, age, educational attainment, occupation, and religion to ensure the sample's composition reflects that of the actual population of Manitoba according to census data and other population estimates.