Continued from here.
All New Polling Thread (pt. 13)
Fri, 2010-04-30 17:34
#1
All New Polling Thread (pt. 13)
Fri, 2010-04-30 17:49
#2
And it starts off with an interesting one from Leger Marketing for the CBC (n=1505, Apr 27-29, internet poll)::
CPC - 36% | Lib - 25% | NDP - 20% | GPC - 8% | BQ - 9%
Best PM ::
Harper - 31% | Layton - 23% | Ignatieff - 16% | May - 4% | DK - 26%
So, Harper is running behind his party vote, while Layton is running ahead of time. Iggy and Liz are holding up the rear.
Fri, 2010-04-30 17:57
#3
Rex Murphy's piece on The National last night appears to be correct. Both Harper and Ignatieff are a drawback for their parties. The Conservatives and the Liberals are both parties that still have strong name recognition, and that's what's keeping them ahead.
Fri, 2010-04-30 18:02
#4
The EKOS poll this week had the NDP at only 17%, though.
It will be interesting to see if they can stay around the 20% level. If they do, it's probably good news for the Conservatives, because it will divide the vote and lead to more Liberals being defeated.
Fri, 2010-04-30 18:03
#5
And so for the third time, ARS, Harris Decima, and now Leger Marketing, pollsters are showing the NDP at 20%, so the question how can the NDP move from 20% to 25% in the polls is quite accurate as has been suggested for some time now.
PS Maybe we should stop posting the EKOS Liberal CBC polling results as they obviously are tainted. Harper said so. 
Fri, 2010-04-30 20:36
#6
It appears that the NDP may be closing in on the Liberals, as now the NDP is within 5 percent of the Liberals.
Fri, 2010-04-30 20:37
#7
And it starts off with an interesting one from Leger Marketing for the CBC (n=1505, Apr 27-29, internet poll)::
CPC - 36% | Lib - 25% | NDP - 20% | GPC - 8% | BQ - 9%
Best PM ::
Harper - 31% | Layton - 23% | Ignatieff - 16% | May - 4% | DK - 26%
So, Harper is running behind his party vote, while Layton is running ahead of time. Iggy and Liz are holding up the rear.
Here's their last poll, 7 months ago:
http://www.legermarketing.com/documents/POL/099281ENG.pdf
A note in the article about their methodology:
Unlike other polling firms, Leger includes the names of the party leaders in the voter intention questions alongside their party names, which the firm says reduces the number of undecided voters in the survey.
"It puts things back in people's minds when they're not concentrating on politics," Christian Bourque, Leger's vice-president of research, told CBC News. "The emphasis on the leader is reflective of politics today."...
To be representative of the Canadian population, Leger says its researchers weighted the data using the latest Statistics Canada information on gender, age, language and region
Fri, 2010-04-30 20:39
#8
It appears that the NDP may be closing in on the Liberals, as now the NDP is within 5 percent of the Liberals.
I doubt that will happen, but if it did, it would be good for the Conservatives.
Fri, 2010-04-30 20:44
#9
All the Liberal fuck-ups are now starting to add up. Since the last Leger Marketing poll the NDP has closed the gap with the Liberals by 8%.
Party / Sep '09 / Apr '10 / Change
Libs / 30% / 25% / Down 5%
NDP / 17% / 20% / Up 3%
Fri, 2010-04-30 21:11
#10
Because their polling model assumes all age groups will vote in the same proportion, they may be underestimating the Conservative lead.
Fri, 2010-04-30 21:19
#11
If the regionals show that the NDP is gaining at the expense of the Conservatives, I don't see how that would be good for the Conservatives. It's the common pattern across both Harris-Decima and EKOS this week. I haven't seen the Leger breakdown (if indeed there was one released) to see if it replicates the trend, but if the NDP is gaining on the Conservatives in BC and the Prairies, that's a direct switch in seats from the latter to the former.
Fri, 2010-04-30 23:07
#12
Harper near majority territory if Leger is correct:( Terrifying poll results. You would think Jaffir and Afghan detainees would push him farther away from a majority not the closest he's been since the coalition crisis.
Fri, 2010-04-30 23:13
#13
Again, we can't say without seeing the regionals. And any of these polls would just be the launching point for a campaign, not the endpoint.
Fri, 2010-04-30 23:45
#14
Keep in mind that in the 2008 election, the Tories ended up with 38% and the Liberals with 26% - and that still left the Tories a dozen seats short of a majority!
Sat, 2010-05-01 00:54
#15
True, and I'm not sure how representative the Leger sample is. They are more of a Quebec pollster than a national pollster.
Sat, 2010-05-01 00:56
#16
Keep in mind that in the 2008 election, the Tories ended up with 38% and the Liberals with 26% - and that still left the Tories a dozen seats short of a majority!
And came within 5% in 17 other seats
Sat, 2010-05-01 01:17
#17
peterjcassidy
If the regionals show that the NDP is gaining at the expense of the Conservatives, I don't see how that would be good for the Conservatives. It's the common pattern across both Harris-Decima and EKOS this week. I haven't seen the Leger breakdown (if indeed there was one released) to see if it replicates the trend, but if the NDP is gaining on the Conservatives in BC and the Prairies, that's a direct switch in seats from the latter to the former.
If the NDP is taking away more from the Liberals , than the NDP is taking from the Conservatives, that could help the Conservbatives in areas where the Libs were first, Conservatives second and NDP third. eg. a totally hypothetical riding where the Liberals won with 40% of the vote, Conservatives 38 NDP 15, Others 7% becomes Liberals 35 Conservatives 36 NDP 22 others 7%.
Then there is always the hope of the Liberal collapse as the PC's went through in 1993 or the UK scenario since the strange death of the Liberal party three lead a near century of Tory/Labour dominance.
Sat, 2010-05-01 01:29
#18
Here is what I predict the Leger poll will say once the regional numbers come out. Since they are providing the leaders names as well as the party names - you can bet your bottom dollar that most of the NDP increase from the 18% they got in the last election to the 20% in this poll will be from getting something like 17% in Quebec (compared to 12% there last time), plus some likely gains in BC (even just from the 26% we got in 2008 back to the 29% we got in 2006) and maybe a point here or there elsewhere.
If my hypothesis is correct, the NDP gains will be almost entirely in places where it will make no difference to the Liberals and will not help the Tories at all. Let's face it - if the NDP vote in Quebec actually did take another leap from 12% to 17% - that main impact would be that Tom Mulcair would win easily over Cauchon and Francoise Boivin would win - otherwise, NDP gains in Quebec are VERY unlikely to be in ridings where it will make a difference to the Tories. Similarly, if other polls are correct and the NDP is drastically narrowing the gap in BC with the Tories - it means Tory seats will go NDP - the Liberals have almost nothing left to lose out west anyways.
The only way that an NDP surge could hypothetically help the Tories take seats from the Liberals would be in Ontario - and even then it would have to be a case of the NDP gains in Ontario not just being concentrated in the NDP northern and inner city strongholds - you would have to start seeing the NDP vote in swing seats like Oakville or Waterloo going from 10% to 20% at the expense of the Liberals - but so far there is little evidence that is happening.
Sat, 2010-05-01 01:30
#19
Keep in mind that in the 2008 election, the Tories ended up with 38% and the Liberals with 26% - and that still left the Tories a dozen seats short of a majority!
And came within 5% in 17 other seats
OK, so when and if the Tory vs. Liberal point spread is 14 points or more - THEN I will worry.
Sat, 2010-05-01 01:42
#20
Let's face it - if the NDP vote in Quebec actually did take another leap from 12% to 17% - that main impact would be that Tom Mulcair would win easily over Cauchon
Actually, as some people in Montreal have pointed out recently, even if the NDP were to tie with the Liberals in Quebec, they still wouldn't necessarily win Outremont against Martin Cauchon. That race will come down to a battle of the two personalities just as much as it will to the polling numbers for their parties.
Martin Cauchon can still beat Tom Mulcair even if the Liberal numbers are bad overall. That's how Justin Trudeau was able to beat Vivian Barbot. It comes down to who is considered the biggest name for the riding and who has the best campaign.
Sat, 2010-05-01 01:55
#21
Actually, if you look at the results in Papineau in 2006 compared to 2008 - you will note that the Liberals won it back by replicating the province-wide swing. In the 2006 election the BQ took 42% of the vote in Quebec and the Liberals took 21% and Vivian Barbot won by about 500 votes. People forget that in 2008, the Liberals actually staged a small recovery to 24%, while the BQ vote dropped to 38% - and as a result Justin Trudeau won back Papineau narrowly by about 1,000 votes - but the riding essentially just went with the swing - and its likely that ANY Liberal candidate would have won back Papineau given that province-wide trend.
I would be willing to bet almost any sum of money that if the NDP vote across Quebec goes from 12% to 17% and the Liberal vote drops a a few points maybe back from 24% to 21% in the next election - Mulcair will win very easily. Cauchon is better than nothing for the Liberals, but let's not exaggerrate his strength as a candidate - the fact is he last ran for office in Outremont ten years ago in 2000 - an eternity ago in politics. Given history as having been a "butler" to the Desmarais family and as having been a big Chretien loyalist - he's anathema to a lot of the francophone elites in Outremont and he would be just the kind of Liberal candidate who would motive the large BQ base in the riding to keep on voting strategically for the NDP. Cauchon is one these typical Quebec federal Liberals that a lot of anglophone Liberal party members living in Toronto go gaga over - but who is regarded as a bit of a non-entity in Quebec itself.
Of course local candidates make some difference - but only to a point and the fact is that Jack Layton is VASTLY more popular in Quebec than is Ignatieff. Cauchon will save his deposit - whch is more than could be said for just about any other dunce the Liberals could run in Outremont.
Sat, 2010-05-01 12:26
#22
Nice to see the strategic voting crowd already getting warmed up. Of course they never depend on any kind of logic, or analysis, just a fear tactic to get people to vote Liberal. It warms the heart to see them getting ready so early. Gives you faith in summer, apple pie, maple syrup and the hockey playoffs.
Sat, 2010-05-01 12:39
#23
The full results of the Leger poll are here:
http://threehundredeight.blogspot.com/2010/05/new-leger-poll-11-pt-conse...
NDP at 19% in Quebec! - all it takes is mentioning the name Layton!
Sat, 2010-05-01 12:55
#24
I really don't see how this can be a big win for the Conservatives. They are only strong where they already hold a stranglehold on seats. No real growth potential showing in this poll at all in terms of seats. The only party with good news from this poll is the NDP, although to a lesser degree I guess you could add the BQ.
Sat, 2010-05-01 13:07
#25
The BC results in Leger seemed off to me, given the massive anti-HST sentiment that's ramping up there again. Still they showed the Libs down and NDP up in BC from Leger's last poll 9 months ago (which however was a larger-sample combo phone+internet poll, while this one is a smaller internet-only sample).
Sat, 2010-05-01 14:04
#26
So the NDP is now polling at 20% but is only projected to win 32 seats. Right.
Sat, 2010-05-01 14:24
#27
remind
Agreed BA, it does not seem to have any good news at all for the CONs, as it appears they are becoming isolated in their seat already held position and gaining no where else.
But I guess those diebold Liberals who want to scare people into switch voting, need any filament of excuse they can get nowadays, to try and shove that nonsense at us.
Sat, 2010-05-01 14:47
#28
Lou Arab
So the NDP is now polling at 20% but is only projected to win 32 seats. Right.
Well, if there is any discouraging note in this poll it's the fact that almost all of the NDP support increase is in Quebec, where the NDP vote is still spread pretty thin. I'm not sure what the magic number is for the NDP to reach in PQ to really start picking up seats, but I could see them going from 12 to 19 per cent and only getting 2-3 more seats, if that. (Having said that, my knowledge of the situation on the ground in Quebec is pretty sketchy - perhaps a seven point increase would reflect in better scores in Montreal and Hull leading to seats. It just seems like there were not a lot of close second and third place showings for the NPD in 2008 that become obvious targets). Conversly, a seven point pick up in other large provinces or regions could easily result 6-10 new seats at least.
Not to be a wet blanket, because this poll shows NDP support solidifying and growing. That's all good - and it leads to more seats evenutally. I'm just saying that if all the regionals in the poll were to come true, we might not see huge seat gains for Jack Layton.
Sat, 2010-05-01 15:17
#29
YOu're right Lou - but the 21% in Ontario in this poll is very encouraging and I think that if the NDP actually did get as high as 19% in Quebec - it would definitely mean more seats - its just hard to know where exactly. The Tories came out of no where in 2006 to win 10 seats in Quebec and most of those were ridings where in the 2004 election the Tory candidate lost their deposit!
The key thing for the NDP in Quebec is that they are the only party with real potential to eat into the BQ vote - its remarkable that the NDP can be at 19% despite the BQ still being at a relatively strong 36% - there are a lot of "soft BQ" voters in that 36% who could be seduced to the NDP if the NDP started to seem viable etc...meanwhile at this stage of the game the most important thing is to get numbers like this that feed morale and news coverage. It will be a lot easier for the NDP to attract good candidates and volunteers and money and news coverage in Quebec if they are seen to be in a three-way tie for second place and moving up!
Sat, 2010-05-01 15:35
#30
Does any poll break out the numbers province-by-province? My own pet enthusiasm is for the great province of Saskatchewan, and it's frustrating that I can't find numbers to begin to guess what might happen next time around.
Sat, 2010-05-01 15:47
#31
Manitoba and Saskatchewan and the Atlantic provinces are all too small to be statistically significant in a national poll. Several times a year, Probe Research does polls of 1,000 in Manitoba alone - but i have not heard of any polls on federal preferences in Sask.
Sat, 2010-05-01 15:51
#32
Actually, there have been repeated polls with breakdowns for Saskatchewan and Manitoba quoted in the "polling" threads, and from what I've seen, those polls have shown a continued Tory plurality in Manitoba and a near-Alberta sized Tory lead in Saskatechewan. The argument has been made that Saskatchewan will not break away from the Tories as long as they have a leader from the Prarairies(Harper). But, if that were the case, how do we account for the fact that Saskatchewan voted overwhelmingly NDP in 1980, when the old Tories were lead by Joe Clark, who was also from Alberta?
Sat, 2010-05-01 15:59
#33
Ken, those polls always combine Saskatchewan and Manitoba - we almost never see a large sample poll of Sask. on its own.
Sat, 2010-05-01 16:19
#34
Yeah, the last federal poll I saw on Saskatchewan was from Angus Reid near the end of the last election, and it had us higher than we wound up being on E-day.
There's quite a sophisticated seat prediction methodology for the UK election which Nate Silver is developing over on fivethirtyeight.com, where he argues that the "uniform swing" approach of most of the UK media's "swing-o-meters" is bogus and rating Labour too high in numbers of seats. I don't think anyone in Canada is doing anything nearly that sophisticated, are they?
Sat, 2010-05-01 17:20
#35
Ken, I'm quite happy to be corrected on this score. Could you point me to some polls that break out the numbers for Sask.? But as Stock says, I believe that SK and MB are rolled into one, which means we don't get a clear picture of either. For my money, I'd say the NDP is looking at least gaining one seat in SK, maybe even a couple more on a sunny day, going downhill and with the wind at its back.
Sat, 2010-05-01 17:25
#36
But that one seat that is looking very good for the NDP (Saskatoon-Humboldt) is largely in play because of a split-the-right candidate in Jim Pankiw. Which sort of undercuts the usefulness of transposing poll results into which seats will fall where.
Sun, 2010-05-02 00:24
#37
I think that if the NDP actually did get as high as 19% in Quebec - it would definitely mean more seats - its just hard to know where exactly. The Tories came out of no where in 2006 to win 10 seats in Quebec and most of those were ridings where in the 2004 election the Tory candidate lost their deposit!
Not quite. There's a big difference. The Conservatives had previous historical strength and representation in those seats. They once occupied all those seats under Brian Mulroney. The NDP has only ever occupied 2 seats briefly so far - Outremont and Chambly.
And a vote increase does not "definitely mean more seats". The popular vote can go up by quite a few points and still not result in any new seats, if the vote increases are not extremely concentrated.
Sun, 2010-05-02 00:38
#38
Theoretically, if the province-wide popular vote in Quebec were identical in every seat - the BQ would win all 75 seats!
I'm just saying that when a party's popular vote goes up that much - at some point it almost invariably starts to pay dividends in seats - while its true that the PCs and the Creditistes had once shown some strength in parts of rural Quebec - Quebec City had no real history of electing Conservatives. In the 2004 election almost every seat in QC went BQ by massive majorities.
We know that the NDP was able to come out of no-where and almost win Gatineau last time despite having had almost no support there in the previous election - all because of Francoise Boivin. With the NDP polling this strongly in Quebec and with there bing such a political vacuum - you may see more star candidates running for the NDP - and I think that the NDP has the potential to attract the "soft-BQ" vote in a way that neither the Liberals nor the Tories ever can.
Sun, 2010-05-02 01:26
#39
I think Gatineau was a special case, but I take your point, Stock. If the NDP begins to poll into the mid-20s in QC, then I think a lot of softBlocs could shift to them. It's the classic prisoner's dilemma of thinking your favoured party will never win so you vote your second choice, but if you only knew how many people thought the same way, the political landscape would change dramatically.
Sun, 2010-05-02 02:07
#40
Would the NDP have come so close in Gatineau if its candidate was not a former Liberal MP?
Sun, 2010-05-02 03:04
#41
You could just as easily ask:
Might the NDP have TAKEN Gatineau if its candidate HADN'T been a former Liberal MP?
That particular political past has positive AND negative connotations to many voters, for many reasons.
Sun, 2010-05-02 07:36
#42
Would the NDP have come so close in Gatineau if its candidate was not a former Liberal MP?
Who suggested it would've been otherwise?
Sun, 2010-05-02 10:26
#43
I think the key is that she is a locally popular and very progressive former Liberal MP, who was clearly too much so for the backroomers of her party to be comfortable with, and that's why they pushed her out. She exemplifies the problem many progressives have had in Quebec: having to decide which was the worse evil to support: a centre-right federalist or a social democratic sovereignist.
Boivin picked the NDP, as did some former Bloc supporters who've also run for us recently.
But it also points out that candidate recruitment can change the calculus so much that trying to use past results to predict future outcomes only tells part of the story.
Sun, 2010-05-02 10:27
#44
I think Augustus is very stuck in wishful thinking. So I had a look.
If you actually look at the seats there are extremely few where a Liberal to NDP trend would help the Conservative candidate. I decided to look at them. I looked at all the marginal seats where the winner could change with such a shift.
There are 9 seats that could go to the Cons if there was such a shift to the NDP. However of those 2 are in BC and 5 in Ontario where the Con drop is greater than the Liberal drop so the Conservatives would not gain anything there. The only two that would be in play are Moncton and Malpeque, the latter in PEI where the Cons have to deal with Guergis' hell hole comment. I suspect the Cons might have a small chance at gaining one seat in this dynamic-- Moncton.
The let's look at the seats the Cons could lose in the same dynamic. These would be where the Con lead the NDP which would gain from the Liberal drop. I found that 3 of these also occurred in BC where the Cons are dropping. In addition there was one Sask seat and one NS seat. The Cons in this dynamic would likely lose all of these 5 seats so they would be down a net of 4 seats.
There are other seats the NDP could pick up from the Liberals or BQ but in fact there are not many. It would take a truly massive switch from the Liberals to the NDP to result in many changes of seats and the few that would come from this are mostly from Con to NDP. The NDP is in many cases already ahead or far to far behind the Liberals to take many more seats from them in a modest shift. As well in the seats the NDP could be a factor in helping the Cons -- the Cons are too far back or trending down themselves so there would be no gains for them.
I think objectively that the kind of switch we are seeing o far would only affect something less than 10 seats and most of these would be Con losses to the NDP so I see no reason for celebration in Con ranks.
If this were to increase enough to change more seats it is likely the Cons would in fact lose more than they would gain although certainly more seats would be in play. In most cases where the NDP is very strong, the Cons are either the competition or are not in it a all. As well the greatest number of these are BC and Ontario which have given the Cons nothing to cheer about in recent polls.
I did this in part to point out the facts but also in reaction Augustus who has been playing a kind of devil's advocate against the NDP here for a time but doing so devoid of any factual basis.
The NDP cloud here is of course the fact that the NDP is actually very far behind in most of the seats it does not hold so the changes would have to be much greater in order to deliver large numbers of seats. However, there is a strong indication that the Liberals would hold on to quite a few seats even in a modest NDP gain which may serve the purpose in dumping the Cons. As well, I suspect that there are three dynamics going on here one is a Con Liberal switch in some places (particularly in marginal Ontario seats), another a Liberal NDP switch (particularly in urban and western seats) and thirdly a Con NDP switch (particularly in western seats). While none of these alone would be that significant they would altogether result in some 30 or more seats moved from the Cons to the opposition. On balance I think none of the opposition parties need to be worried right now and the Cons need to be fearful that this could be the perfect storm. The Cons could lose 15 seats to the Liberals in Ontario, 5 seats to the NDP nationally, and 5 to the BQ with these numbers for a loss of 25 seats. This is at the start of a campaign-- if a campaign were to allow those trends to grow the Cons could end up being the second party not much ahead of the third and fourth parties. The House could end up looking more like this: Liberals 103, Cons 100, BQ 55, NDP 55. Most of the Liberal gains would be in Ontario, most of the NDP gains would be in the West. This would be a terrible result for the Cons but even worse for the Liberals as the Liberals would be in government but in shooting distance for the NDP which if that government did not do well could result in the NDP and Liberals switching places int he following election. The NDP usually makes its greatest gains against an unpopular/weak Liberal government. For the NDP this is the ideal scenario-- for the Liberals to win the next election by a hair with the NDP not far behind (55 seats to 100 would indicate a slim pop vote difference)
Here is the list of seats I looked closely at where the Cons would either gain or lose (did not consider NDP-BQ-Liberal switches as we were speaking of the Cons)
Seats the Cons might pick up if uniform
BC-Vancouver South-- Dosonijh's seat Cons have dropped further in BC
BC-Esquimault-Juan de Fuca-- Cons have dropped further in BC
ON-Brampton West-- Cons are down more than Liberals
On-Brampton Springdale-- as above
On-Guelph -- as above
On-Mississauga South
ON- Eglinnton Lawrence
NB-Moncton-R-D
PEI- Malpeque
Seats Cons could lose to NDP
NS South Shore St Margret's
SK Saskatoon rosetown Bigger
BC-New Westminister
BC- Surrey North
BC-Vancouver Island North
Sun, 2010-05-02 11:35
#45
New Westminster is already NDP....
The thing is that in the last election, the NDP took most of the Liberal/NDP marginals - so there isn't much more to pick up. The only ridings that went somewhat narrowly Liberal over NDP were St. John's East-Mount Pearl, Dartmouth-Cole Harbour, Beaches-East York and Parkdale-High Park - that was it.
The list of seats that went narrowly Tory over NDP was quite a bit longer and so in the next election, you will see that most of the new seats the NDP will be targetting will be Tory/NDP marginals in western Canada - as well as some "one off" Tory NDP marginals likes South Shore-St. Margaret's and Oshawa.
The one "caveat" to all this is TORONTO. The Liberals have practically been reduced to being nothing but a Toronto party and about half of their current caucus is from the GTA. There are actually quite a few seats in Toronto that are quite "working class" and that would be fertile NDP territory if they were in Vancouver or Winnipeg or even Hamilton. I'm thinking of places like Davenport, York-South Weston, York West, Etobicoke North, most of the Scarborough seats...If we could find a way to break the back of the Liberals in that last remaining stronghold - it would open up a swath of new NDP targets. Alas, for some reason the NDP has a bit of a "Toronto problem" - I think its a combo of reasons - the local media (ie: the Toronto Star) is flagrantly pro Liberal, there seems to be a bit of a vestigial attitude in a lot of immigrant communities that you HAVE to vote Liberal because Trudeau let in your ancestors and because when the Liberals were in power they doled out a lot of patronage to various ethnic NGOs. On top of that some of the NDP's populist rhetoric (which serves us very well in most of Canada) doesn't always go over as well in Toronto where a lot of people have been brainwashed into buying into the "what's good for Bay St. is good for Canada" ethos. On top of that the Liberals are very top heavy with high profile MPs from Toronto (ie: Iggy, Rae, Kennedy, Dryden, Lee etc...) - of course these people get a lot of attention partly because the Liberals have so few people from the rest of the country.
Sun, 2010-05-02 11:50
#46
VM communities want 'prosperity'; the NDP offers 'anti-poverty'.
Sun, 2010-05-02 12:25
#47
New Westminster is already NDP....
I suspect he might have meant nearby Pitt Meadows-Mission-Maple Ridge, BC, which wasn't on the list, or Newton-North Delta (although that's Liberal right now).
Sun, 2010-05-02 13:52
#48
And so for the third time, ARS, Harris Decima, and now Leger Marketing, pollsters are showing the NDP at 20%, so the question how can the NDP move from 20% to 25% in the polls is quite accurate as has been suggested for some time now.
You know what? Getting over 20% in a few polls close to each other in time is really good for the party, but I don't think anyone except for you would ever try to argue that this is the new norm, especially since it has only happened 4 times out of about 140 since the last election.
What is important though is that the party is moving forward in most polls. It is a positive trend. Choosing the right side of some important issues - HST, ethics/accountability, pensions - has no doubt helped the party, and apparently at the expense at the Conservatives in BC and Ontario.
With even Ekos and Ipsos showing signs of an upward trend, though both short of 20%, the question remains how can the party keep the momentum once those NDP/Con wedge issues (ie: HST enaction, Guergis, detainee documents) are resolved or fade in the public mind.
Sun, 2010-05-02 14:00
#49
The one "caveat" to all this is TORONTO. The Liberals have practically been reduced to being nothing but a Toronto party and about half of their current caucus is from the GTA. There are actually quite a few seats in Toronto that are quite "working class" and that would be fertile NDP territory if they were in Vancouver or Winnipeg or even Hamilton. I'm thinking of places like Davenport, York-South Weston, York West, Etobicoke North, most of the Scarborough seats...If we could find a way to break the back of the Liberals in that last remaining stronghold - it would open up a swath of new NDP targets. Alas, for some reason the NDP has a bit of a "Toronto problem" - I think its a combo of reasons - the local media (ie: the Toronto Star) is flagrantly pro Liberal, there seems to be a bit of a vestigial attitude in a lot of immigrant communities that you HAVE to vote Liberal because Trudeau let in your ancestors and because when the Liberals were in power they doled out a lot of patronage to various ethnic NGOs. On top of that some of the NDP's populist rhetoric (which serves us very well in most of Canada) doesn't always go over as well in Toronto where a lot of people have been brainwashed into buying into the "what's good for Bay St. is good for Canada" ethos. On top of that the Liberals are very top heavy with high profile MPs from Toronto (ie: Iggy, Rae, Kennedy, Dryden, Lee etc...) - of course these people get a lot of attention partly because the Liberals have so few people from the rest of the country.
Then again, Jack Layton's a leader from Toronto--but then, that might be paradoxically part of the problem, in that Torontonians are more conditioned by his having been an city councillor, and (if I may play devil's advocate) an obnoxious "NDP city councillor" cliche to boot; y'know, CBC-listening NOW-reading champagne-socialists on two wheels, etc. If it were he rather than David Miller bearing the mayoral-run standard in 2003, he wouldn't have done as well beyond his hardcore base--a reverse version of Rob Ford's current dilemma.
Sure, he's managed to overcome a lot of that burden as national leader. But within home turf, Layton's "reputation" precedes him--and maybe all the more so now if there's a municipal anti-Miller/anti-NDP mood in the air...
Sun, 2010-05-02 18:11
#50
Yes sorry New westminster was a mistake-- of course the main point remains there are very few marginal seats the Liberals have that could go Conservative due to a Liberal NDP switch--and most of those are in the two provinces that do not apply because the cons have lost more than the Liberals there (BC and Ontario).
There is no silver lining to this cloud for the Cons.
The NDP did win most of the Lib-NDP marginal ridings already but that was not the question.
Sun, 2010-05-02 19:35
#51
Would the NDP have come so close in Gatineau if its candidate was not a former Liberal MP?
Who suggested it would've been otherwise?
Doesn't it bother the NDP that they have to rely on a former LIBERAL MP in order to win a seat?