A new poll suggests just one in four Canadians trust the federal government to do what is right, while the majority believe politicians lose touch with the public soon after being elected.

The poll, released today, indicates that Canadians seem to be growing increasingly cynical about government.

Prof. David Zussman, who conducted the research for the Trudeau Foundation, said Canadians appeared to be following a trend seen in other countries.

"What's interesting is ... it's pretty much mirrored by most Western democracies. So this is not just a Canadian issue. We'd have the same numbers in Washington, London or Paris," Prof. Zussman said.

"It really reflects a global shift in attitudes towards the role of government and the mistrust of government."

Only 27 per cent of those polled said they trusted the government to do what was right always or most of the time.

This compares to about 58 per cent of Canadians who were surveyed in the late 1960s.

Fifty-seven per cent of respondents agreed with the statement: "I don't think the government cares much about what people like me think," compared to 48 per cent in July 2003.

And 65 per cent of those polled said they believed politicians lost touch with the public after they were voted into office.

While many respondents said they distrusted politicians, 78 per cent said they had high opinions of workers at non-government organizations and believed they had high ethical standards.

Seventy-five per cent said the same about doctors while only 25 per cent thought business executives had high ethical standards and only 21 per cent thought the same of politicians.

The poll found 85 per cent of respondents said they had never been a member of political party or hadn't worked for a party in the past three years.

Those numbers suggest people don't want to follow the lead of today's politicians, Prof. Zussman said.

"I think a lot of people are not being drawn into political engagement in large part because they don't have trust in the people that occupy those positions now," he said. "They don't see it as worthwhile."

The poll was released Friday at the Trudeau Foundation Conference, being held in Toronto in collaboration with the Institute for Research on Public Policy.

The survey, conducted by EKOS for the Trudeau Foundation, polled 1,500 adults during August, September and October.

The results are considered accurate within plus or minus 2.5 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.