A majority of Canadians feel their country makes too many accommodations to visible minorities, according to a new poll.

The survey, conducted for CTV News and the Globe and Mail by The Strategic Counsel, showed 61 per cent of Canadians felt Canada was doing too much.

In Quebec, 72 per cent said too many accommodations were being made.

Fifty-five per cent of Canadians living in large cities said Canada was making too many accommodations for visible minorities in comparison to 71 per cent in communities of less than 30,000.

"I think in a lot of smaller communities, people's exposure to this is through the media, they see a lot of sensationalized stories -- the debate over Shariah law, public funding for religious schools, whether women should be wearing veils to vote," Peter Donolo, a partner with the polling firm the Strategic Counsel, told CTV.ca.

"So they'll always see these flashpoint issues whereas the reality of living in a large urban area where there might be large numbers of visible minorities is just a lot more mundane."

In Canada, about five million Canadian citizens are members of visible minority groups.

The survey showed 48 per cent of Canadians felt that number was a positive for the country. Nine per cent said it was a negative and 42 per cent were not sure.

Of Liberal supporters, 55 per cent said it was a good thing for Canada while only 38 per cent of Tory supporters felt the same way. Fifty-three per cent of NDP backers, 56 per cent of Bloc Québécois supporters and 59 per cent of Green Party backers said the amount of visible minority groups was a positive.

Meanwhile, 88 per cent of Canadians said they felt their community was welcoming to people from visible minority groups.

However, the survey also showed that 45 per cent of Canadians felt new immigrants hold onto their customs and traditions for too long.

Forty-seven per cent of Canadians felt new Canadians integrate into Canadian life at a natural and acceptable pace.

In communities less than 30,000, 54 per cent felt new Canadians held onto customs for too long, compared to 42 per cent in cities with more than one million people.

Donolo said some of the survey's results might help to explain certain policy decisions made in Ottawa -- such as the Tory initiative to ban face veils at voting booths.

"They (the Tories) clearly understand there's an anxiety particularly among their own voters about this," said Donolo. "They also understand that there's potential appeal for Bloc Quebecois voters who also feel strongly on that particular issue of accommodations."

The survey showed 82 per cent of Bloc Québécois voters felt Canada yields too much in making accommodations.

However, Donolo said the Tories have to be careful to avoid being stereotyped as anti-immigrant or anti-visible minority.

That could be detrimental since "they're trying to broaden their base and appeal to voters in minority communities," he said.

The poll of 1,000 Canadians was conducted from last Thursday to Sunday, and is accurate to within 3.1 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.