Liberals won over Muslims by huge margin in 2015, poll suggests

Muslim Canadians voted overwhelmingly for the Liberal Party in last year's election, helping Justin Trudeau secure the majority government that nine out of 10 of Muslims believe will help improve relations between themselves and other Canadians, according to a new survey.

The poll of Muslim Canadians also found widespread support for the right to wear a niqab during a citizenship ceremony and a large degree of opposition to the anti-terrorism legislation known as Bill C-51, two hot-button issues that may have cost the Conservatives dearly in the last federal election.

You can read the rest of this article here.

The Pollcast: Politics and Muslim Canadians

Never before has a federal election campaign in Canada focused so much on issues related to Muslim Canadians. But lost in the cacophony of the campaign might have been what Muslim Canadians themselves thought about the roiling debate.

A new survey by the Environics Institute, however, sheds some light on what Muslim Canadians think about these issues, their religion and the new Liberal government.

In addition to finding that Muslim Canadians are both increasingly patriotic and devout, the survey found high levels of support for the Liberals in the last election, belief in the right for Muslims to wear the niqab at citizenship ceremonies and optimism that the new government will help improve relations between Muslims and other Canadians.

Joining me to discuss the results of his landmark survey of Muslim Canadians is Keith Neuman, Executive Director of the Environics Institute.

You can listen to the latest episode of the Pollcast here.

Muslim Canadians increasingly proud of and attached to Canada, survey suggests

An overwhelming majority of Muslim Canadians have a strong attachment to their country and feel that Canada is heading in the right direction, according to a new survey.

But the survey also finds that young Muslims, a cohort that is increasingly devout, have more attachment to their religious identity than older Muslims and are more likely to be concerned and pessimistic about discrimination.

These are the findings of a survey of 600 Canadian Muslims conducted by the Environics Institute between November 2015 and February 2016. It follows up on a survey conducted 10 years ago and suggests that Muslim Canadians are becoming increasingly integrated into the broader Canadian society.

You can read the rest of this article here.

Approval ratings of five Prime Ministers

Trawling through the archives, I came across a compilation of approval ratings polling by Environics, stretching from 1985 to 2009. Something like that is just too interesting not to share.

The polls show some pretty clear patterns, at least after the tumultuous tenure of Brian Mulroney. Canadians have tended to be pretty satisfied with their prime ministers over the last two decades. But disapproval ratings inched upwards as time went on, until the prime minister either stepped aside or was forced aside by voters.

In the chart below, the darker trend line refers to approval ratings. The lighter one represents disapproval ratings.

Click to magnify

Mulroney's numbers are the most dramatic. For almost the entirety of his time in office, more Canadians (often many more) disapproved of him than approved of him. But in 1988 his numbers surged just enough to secure re-election, before his ratings tumbled down once again.

When Environics' polling starts, in June 1985, Mulroney was enjoying a post-election honeymoon with an approval rating of 61%. But that soon collapsed, to 43% in November, 34% in September 1986, and 23% in May 1987.

From there, he started to rebound. By the end of 1987 he was back up to 28%. By the spring of 1988 he was at 34%, and in October 1988 he was at 36%. The following month, his party won re-election with 41% of the vote.

And again Mulroney experienced a honeymoon, with his approval rating soaring to 60% in March 1989. It did not last long, falling to 45% in June of that year and 29% in December. But unlike his first term, Mulroney did not rebound. By the end of 1990, his approval rating was just 17%. By mid-1991, it was only 12% with an incredible 83% of Canadians saying they disapproved of the prime minister. It did not get much better until he stepped aside in June 1993, when his approval rating was 15%.

Here we can see the roots of the disastrous showing of the Progressive Conservatives in 1993. The party's numbers did rebound under Kim Campbell, but in the end the party captured just about as much of the vote as the proportion of Canadians who approved of Mulroney when he stepped down.

Overall, Mulroney averaged an approval rating of just 27% and a disapproval of 65% during his time in office. In his first term, his approval rating averaged 36%. In his second term, it was just 22%.

Campbell was in office long enough for only one of Environics' polls, and it was a good one for her: 48% approval to 31% disapproval. But her party was drummed out of power in October 1993.

Jean Chrétien took office, and had the same kind of numbers as Mulroney did when he won re-election in 1988: an approval rating of 62% and a disapproval rating of just 14% in December 1993.

But Chrétien proved much more popular than Mulroney, and from the 1993 election to September 1995 his approval rating hovered at 61% or over, topping out at 66% in December 1994. His disapproval rating, however, increased: to 23% at the end of 1994 to 29% on the eve of the Quebec referendum.

Though his side won that campaign, that it came so close to losing may have cost Chrétien. In December 1995, his approval rating was down to 53%, with disapproval jumping to 38%. His numbers would stick to this level for another year.

For the first time as prime minister, Chrétien's approval rating dropped below 50% at the end of 1996 and in early 1997. It did not bode well for the 1997 election, and the Liberals just eked out another majority.

Chrétien experienced another honeymoon at this point, with his approval rating rising above the 50% mark until it hit 61% in early 1998. It wobbled back and forth between 50% and 64% until early 2000, when it briefly fell to 36%. That was his lowest result ever. Perhaps it was anomalous, as his approval rating jumped back to 55% a few months later.

By 2003, however, Chrétien's welcome was beginning to wear out. His approval rating fell to between 42% and 45% that year, as his disapproval rating reached majority status for only the second time during his tenure. He was gone by the end of the year.

On average, Chrétien boasted some impressive numbers. During his entire time in office, he averaged an approval rating of 54%, against 37% disapproval. But here again we see that time takes its toll: his approval rating averaged 58% in his first term, 54% in his second, and 50% in his third. By then, his disapproval rating was averaging 46%, compared to 31% in his first term.

Paul Martin improved upon Chrétien's numbers when he took over. His approval rating was 53% at the beginning of 2004, increasing to 56% by the summer. In 2005, however, his numbers began to sink. His approval rating was 48% at the beginning of that year, drooping to 41% in the spring (and disapproval jumping to 56%, higher than anything Chrétien managed). There was a small uptick over the summer of 2005, and it was time for another election. But in this case Martin would come up short.

Over his short tenure, Martin averaged an approval rating of 49%, with disapproval at 46%.

Stephen Harper, like Mulroney and Chrétien before him, enjoyed a honeymoon after winning the 2006 vote. His approval rating was 61% after that victory, with disapproval at just 27%. His approval ratings dropped to 53% by the end of the year, as his disapproval ratings shot up almost immediately, to 42%.

Things held steady in 2007, with his approval rating hovering between 49% and 57%, with disapproval between 37% and 47%. But in 2008, Harper's approval rating dropped below 50%, and by the spring the country was split down the middle on the prime minister. By the end of 2008, his disapproval rating had hit a majority of respondents.

Apart from an early 2009 poll (which saw Harper's numbers go back to 50% after winning the 2008 election), that is where the story ends. That is unfortunate, since it is useful to have these numbers coming from the same polling firm.

The latest approval ratings from EKOS and Forum pegged Harper's approval rating to be around 36% which, aside from the anomalous Chrétien poll, would be the lowest by any prime minister since the Mulroney years. But we may be comparing apples to oranges here.

It certainly fits into the trend of a gradual decline in fortunes the longer a prime minister stays in office. But that rate of decline differs. Over his three terms, Chrétien's approval ratings dropped by eight points. Over Mulroney's two, it fell (on average) by 14 points. From start to finish, though, Mulroney plummeted by 46 points, Chrétien by just 17. Martin was down by about 10 over some 18 months.

So this chart may tell us little about what to expect going forward, but it does stand as an interesting historical document.

A deeper look at polls from Environics and Ipsos-Reid

The two most recent federal polls unleashed on the world came from Ipsos-Reid and Environics Research Group. Both polls were taken at the end of June, which means that they are now a little dated. So instead of looking at the overall numbers, let's take a look at some of the numbers that weren't included in their original releases.

First, the Environics poll. In addition to the usual regional breakdown that Environics includes in its release, the polling firm also records 'sub-regional' support and was kind enough to pass those numbers along.

The last time I had these numbers was in June 2012, at the height of Thomas Mulcair's honeymoon with Canadians. Compared to those numbers, the New Democrats have fallen 11 points in Environics's polling, while the Conservatives have been down five and the Liberals gained 15.

At the sub-regional level, however, we can see where some of these gains and losses have disproportionately taken place. Compared to the shift in national support, the Liberals have surged disproportionately in Toronto (Environics defines Vancouver, Toronto, and Montreal as their CMAs) by 22 points to 50% support. They were up 28 points, also to 50%, in Newfoundland and Labrador. Both of those shifts in support are well outside the margin of error, even for the small samples used for these regions.

It should be noted, however, that Environics also did a poll of 1,000 Newfoundlanders and Labradorians at around the same time as their national June 2012 poll, and compared to those numbers the Liberals were up only 16 points.

Liberal support grew by about the same amount as it did nationally in Saskatchewan (14 points), Montreal (13 points), and Vancouver (13 points), but only by 11 points in Manitoba.

For the Conservatives, their support fell disproportionately in Vancouver (10 points) and Saskatchewan (8 points), while it maintained itself better in Newfoundland and Labrador (down two points), Toronto (three points), and Montreal (two points). But in these areas, the Conservatives did not have much further to drop.

And the New Democrats suffered most in Newfoundland and Labrador (down 25 points and losing the lead), Montreal (down 15 points), and Toronto (14 points), while they fell only four points in Saskatchewan. They were also down 12 points in Vancouver and eight points in Manitoba.

With these levels of support, the Liberals would win five seats in Newfoundland and Labrador to two for the NDP, while the Tories would be shut out. In Manitoba, the Tories would take eight, the Liberals four, and the NDP two, and in Saskatchewan the Conservatives would win 11, the NDP two, and the Liberals one.

The extra bit of precision for the Prairie provinces does have an effect, as using the overall Prairie numbers to project seats short-changes the NDP by two (giving one extra seat to the Liberals and Conservatives).

For the Ipsos-Reid poll, the firm did something different in trying to assess likelihood of voting. They found that, among the general population, the Liberals led with 33% to 30% for the Conservatives and 28% for the New Democrats. The regional numbers would deliver seats in the following proportions:

The three parties would be almost even, with 121 for the Conservatives, 112 for the Liberals, and 102 for the New Democrats, with the Bloc and Greens taking three seats together.

The Conservatives pull more seats from fewer votes because of their advantage in the western provinces and in Ontario. A tie there (34% to 34%) is more advantageous for the Tories. But the party would only win five seats east of the Ottawa River.

When Ipsos-Reid looked at only those who were most committed to vote (about 60% of the sample, interestingly enough considering that is a very plausible turnout number), the Liberals were boosted to 35%, with the Tories dropping to 29% and the NDP to 26%. For those wondering, that is counter to what my simple turnout model would have given for this poll (34% CPC to 33% LPC and 24% NDP). With Ipsos's regional numbers for likely voters (which the firm was also nice enough to pass along), the Liberals move ahead in seats:

The Liberals win 126 seats to 114 for the Conservatives and 95 for the NDP. The big difference is in Ontario, as the turnout numbers give the Liberals 38% to 34% for the Conservatives. But turnout benefits the Tories in B.C. and the NDP in the Prairies and Quebec.

Despite the difference between Ipsos-Reid's total sample and likely voters being relatively marginal (no party moved by more than two points nationally), the consequences are far more important. In the first scenario, the Conservatives might actually try their luck at a minority government. They would likely be defeated by the Liberals and NDP, but if those two parties did decide to work together they would each need to be given almost equal heft in a coalition.

In the second scenario, the Conservatives likely would not try to form a minority government and instead the Liberals would try their hand at it (yes, I know that the Tories could try to continue to govern but I'm assuming they wouldn't, as Jean Charest did in Quebec). If they did work with the NDP, they would be able to call more of the shots holding 57% of the coalition's seats instead of 52%, and finishing much further ahead in the popular vote (nine points instead of five).

This emphasizes just how important likely voter numbers will be in the next election. I am happy to see that more firms are starting to think about how they will go about this in 2015.

35 years of polling

There was a flurry of polls released just prior to Justin Trudeau's leadership victory last Sunday, but since he took over it has been virtual silence. Forum ventured out with a post-announcement poll that, putting the Liberals at 43%, has to be considered on the high side. Unfortunately, no other pollster has waded into the pool since then, so we don't know if Trudeau was indeed giving the Liberals that much of a boost.

So if we can't find any recent polls, let's find some really old polls.

When I was poking around the various public opinion poll archives that exist, I came across a table that compiled all of the voting intentions polling from Environics stretching back to 1978. I used the data for my article today for The Globe and Mail looking at leadership boosts. Check it out.

But let's take a look at this polling from Environics stretching back 35 years. Note that I calculated the share of decideds only in the chart below, corrected what appeared to be a few transcription errors in the chart, and used my own monthly averages after 2010. The chart is not calibrated to give equal space to equal time, but it is close enough.

Environics federal polling, 1978-2010 (Click to magnify)

And there you see the vagaries of public opinion over a handful of decades.

What is most striking about these numbers to me is that the political landscape of the 1990s and 2000s that we have come to consider as the norm in Canada were actually pretty anomalous. The race was a close three-way race for much of the 1980s and the very early 1990s, making the current situation more reminiscent of those days than anything particularly new.

Throughout the 1990s and early 2000s, the Liberals were way ahead of the pack. They weren't Canada's dominant party only because of a split of the vote on the right, either. The very pale blue line combines the support of the Progressive Conservatives and the Reform/Canadian Alliance parties throughout that period, and only at the end of 1993 before the PCs bottomed out was the combined support for these parties anywhere close to where the Liberals were (true, the race was closer during elections but outside of them the Liberals were coasting).

It is interesting to see that the recent surge in NDP support is nothing that this country has not seen before. The New Democrats were routinely polling above 20% in 1981-1982 and continuously between 1985 and 1992 - a very long period of time politically. The New Democrats were second in the country, or at least tied for it, for a brief time in 1982 and then from around 1986 to 1992, when the New Democrats were leading nationally in a few individual polls in 1987, 1990, and 1991.

The chart does suggest, however, that opinion was much more fluid in the 1980s than it was throughout most of the period starting in the 1990s and since. In a relatively short period of time the Liberals or PCs would surge or drop 10 to 20 points or more. The Tories were under 30% at the end of 1979, and then rose all the way to over 50% by 1983, while the Liberals were at 50% in 1980 before slipping to 20% by 1984.

It demonstrates how every party has had its day in the sun and its catastrophic drops.

The New Democrats were gaining consistently after 1984 until they moved into first in 1987, while they dropped from first in 1991 to fifth and under 10% in 1993. They slowly gained from then until their boost in 2011.

The Liberals were up-and-down under Pierre Trudeau and then John Turner, before gaining again under Jean Chrétien and dropping under Paul Martin. Much of the damage was done at that point of time, it seems, in large part due to the Gomery Inquiry. Stéphane Dion and Michael Ignatieff could only give the party fleeting blips of support before dropping again.

And then there are the Tories, struggling before Brian Mulroney became leader, struggling again just before his first mandate was over, and then dropping like a stone shortly after his 1988 election victory as the Reform Party ate into their support. The Progressive Conservatives in the 1990s they were vying for runner-up status in the mid-teens with the Bloc Québécois, New Democrats, and the Reform/Canadian Alliance parties. The Canadian Alliance took off a little when Stockwell Day was named leader, but they never really challenged the Liberals.

Only after the merger of the parties did the Conservatives become competitive, and by 2006 they were leading in national voting intentions, something they have not yet given up for any long period of time. But their recent polling is among their worst as a united party. The last time they dropped this low was around the time that Reform and the Bloc started pulling their coalition apart.

I think this chart shows how difficult it is to predict anything beyond a few months into the future with any accuracy. The creation of the Bloc, and then its destruction at the hands of the NDP, was unexpected. That the Liberals would poll well over 40% and easily lead a crowd of small parties for a decade could hardly have been seen in the days when the New Democrats were pushing the Liberals into third in the late 1980s. That the Progressive Conservatives would be reduced to two seats within a decade of polling at almost 60%, and that they would eventually be taken over by a Western protest party, would have seemed like some fantastical alternative history.

So how might Justin Trudeau do in 2015? A better question, considering the peaks and valleys of this chart, might just be how he will do next month. And then we'll see.

Alberta Tories still in control

A few days before this weekend's annual general meeting of the Progressive Conservatives in Alberta, Environics released the details of their latest survey of provincial voting intentions. They show that the Progressive Conservatives remain comfortably in the lead, and have made inroads in rural Alberta.

Environics was last in the field Aug. 10-22 and since then the PCs picked up two points, leading with 45% support. Wildrose was up three points to 29%, while the Liberals at 13% and the New Democrats at 12% each lost one point.

None of these shifts in support were outside of the margin of error of this telephone poll. Environics' report on the poll is compact, but thankfully includes the unweighted and weighted samples of their survey.

Alison Redford's Tories led in both Edmonton and Calgary with 43% and 45% respectively, putting them ahead of Wildrose (23% and 25%). The Liberals did better in Calgary than they did in Edmonton, with 20% to 14% support, while the opposite was the case for the New Democrats (19% to 9%). All in all, this is generally what we've seen in Alberta for some time.

The Progressive Conservatives also led in Alberta's small cities with 49%, while Wildrose picked-up nine points to hit 31%. The New Democrats trailed with 13%, while the Liberals were down 12 points to 6% in the province's smaller urban centres (where they hold no seats).

In the rural parts of the province, the Tories were up 10 points to 47%, putting them ahead of Wildrose. Danielle Smith's party fell to 43%. The NDP managed 6% support and the Liberals were down five points to 4%.

As this poll was taken during the month of October, any of the fallout from recent controversy over MLA compensation or the decisions made at the annual general meeting concerning the party's links with the federal Conservatives was not recorded. It is unclear whether any of this will have any effect - the Tories have been comfortably leading in every poll since the last election and, so far, do not seem in danger of losing many of the centrist supporters they attracted in April back to the Liberals.

Wildrose, meanwhile, has a lot of ground to make up. They've lost about 10 points in Calgary and, whereas they were neck-and-neck with the Tories in the last election outside of the two main cities, this poll puts them about 10 points behind. There is no reason for Wildrose to hit the panic button just yet, however, as the next election is scheduled for 2016.

NDP leads in Environics poll

Last week, Environics released a new survey showing the New Democrats holding a four-point lead over the Conservatives. The numbers in the poll were particularly striking in Ontario, where the NDP was also pegged with the advantage.

Environics was last in the field Jun. 12-23, and since then the New Democrats held steady with 35% support. The Conservatives were down two points to 31% while the Liberals were up one point to 20% in the poll.

The Bloc Québécois was up two points to 9% while the Greens were down one to 5%.

It is worth noting that shortly after the Environics poll was released another poll emerged from Forum Research that gave the Tories a four-point advantage. I will take a closer look at that poll tomorrow, but it is already included in the weighted federal poll averages at the top of this page.

None of the shifts in support since the June Environics poll are outside the margin of error, while the NDP's lead is equal to the margin of error on this sort of gap between the two parties.

The most significant shifts took place in Ontario, where the NDP gained six points to top the table at 36%. The Conservatives fell eight points to 32%, while the Liberals were at 26%. This is a rather spectacular result for the New Democrats, who have struggled in Ontario of late. This result from Environics could be a bit of an outlier in that regard. But with the provincial scene in flux, it could very well be that the federal one is as well.

In Quebec, the New Democrats fell seven points to 37% while the Bloc was up by that amount to close to within four points with 33%. This sort of result has been replicated in several recent polls, suggesting that the PQ's provincial victory may be rubbing off on the Bloc. If that is the case, we should probably expect the Bloc's support to dip in coming weeks.

The Conservatives led in Alberta with 55%, while the New Democrats trailed at 23%. The Liberals gained seven points to hit 15% in the province.

The New Democrats led in Atlantic Canada with 44%, while the Conservatives were given the advantage in the Prairies with 49% and British Columbia with 42%.

Despite the four-point NDP lead, the Conservatives still would win a plurality of seats with 132 on the proposed boundaries of the new 338-seat map. The New Democrats win 119, the Liberals 61, the Bloc Québécois 25, and the Greens one.

The reason is simple: the NDP's vote in Ontario is not efficient enough to make up for the loss of (potential) gains in British Columbia and the Prairies, where the NDP has usually been doing better in the polls. And losing out on so many seats in Quebec to the Bloc makes a huge difference. The new boundaries also disadvantage the NDP somewhat (particularly due to the extra seats in B.C. and Alberta) - on the current boundaries the Tories would take 121 seats to the NDP's 114.

But with the NDP and Liberals being able to combine for 180 seats on the expanded map (and 169 on the current one), the Conservatives would be unlikely to hold on to power for much longer.

Despite a less-than-advantageous regional breakdown, this is a good poll for the New Democrats. They need to make inroads in Ontario in order to win the next election, but they also need to hold on to their vote in Quebec and make small (but seemingly easier) gains in the West. If the Tories are losing support in Ontario but re-gaining the advantage in B.C. and the Prairies, the party could be returning to its traditional base, one that is good enough to win an election but not enough to win a majority.

Majority support for federal NDP in Newfoundland & Labrador?

Environics released a new poll earlier this week, showing that the New Democrats continue to hold a narrow lead over the Conservatives, mostly unchanged from their last poll of May 7-9. But a sub-regional breakdown provided to ThreeHundredEight shows that the NDP is running away with things in Newfoundland and Labrador - and struggling in Saskatchewan.

Compared to Environics' last poll, the NDP is down one point to 35% while the Tories are up one to 33%, an insignificant shift even on a large sample size such as this. The Liberals are unchanged at 19%, while the Bloc stands at 7% and the Greens are down one to 6%.

The Conservatives are up four points in Ontario to 40%, while the NDP is down two to 30%. The gap stands at 10 points, but that has been bouncing around from poll to poll. The Liberals, down three to 23%, have been struggling in most surveys.

In Quebec, the New Democrats are down one point to 44% and the Bloc Québécois is up one to 26%. The Liberals are up two to 15% and the Tories are down three to 12%, none of these being very significant changes in support.

The gap has narrowed in British Columbia, where the NDP is down six points to 37% and the Tories are up five to 34%. The Liberals are well behind the pack with 21% (+1), while the Greens are down two points to 8%.

Alberta and the Prairies are standard fare, while the NDP is up 13 points in Atlantic Canada to 44%. The Liberals are up 10 to 30%, while the Conservatives are down 15 to 23%. These wild swings are likely statistical noise, but the sample is more robust than usual: Environics over-sampled the region to get useable Newfoundland numbers (but of course, those were scaled back to represent an accurate weight within the region).

None of these regional results are remarkable, they generally line-up with what most other polls show to be the case. But the sub-regional results are fascinating, giving us a look at the country's three largest cities (and their metropolitan areas), how the vote breaks down in the Prairies, and where things stand on the Rock.

We shall start out West, where the New Democrats lead in Vancouver with 41%, putting them ahead of the Conservatives by eight points. The Liberals stand third with 24% support in and around the city.

Moving to Saskatchewan, we see that the NDP is not doing as well in the province as has been expected. Most of their gains in the Prairies appear to be heavily weighted to Manitoba, where the race is quite close.

In Saskatchewan, the Conservatives are down nine points from the election to 47% support, but the New Democrats have slipped four points to 28%. This does not put them in range of winning any seats, maintaining the status quo of 13 Conservatives and one Liberal (they are up four points to 13% in the region). The Green result, at 12%, is probably too high, but it is difficult to know for sure where those votes might go.

The Conservatives have dropped 15 points in Manitoba to 39%, while the NDP is up nine points to 35%. The Liberals, meanwhile, are steady with 17% support. This would likely deliver four seats to the NDP and one to the Liberals in the province, with the remaining nine going to the Tories. That is down two seats for them.

In Toronto, the race is a close one: the Conservatives have 33% support, the NDP has 31%, and the Liberals have 28%. This suggests that the NDP is starting to breakthrough into the outlying suburbs of Toronto, but that the Liberals are still a force in the city.

The NDP is running away with it in Montreal, where they have 52% support. The Bloc is the runner-up with 21%, putting them narrowly ahead of the Liberals. They have 16% support, much of that undoubtedly concentrated on the West Island. The Tories are completely out of the race with 8% support in the area.

And that brings us to Newfoundland and Labrador. The sample for the province isn't huge, with an MOE of just under eight points, but it is large enough to give us an idea of what is going on. I'm also told that a larger sample has backed up these results. Environics puts NDP support in Newfoundland and Labrador at 59% support, up an amazing 26 points since the election. The Liberals are down 16 points to 22%, while the Tories are down 10 points to 18%. With this sort of swing, the New Democrats could win four seats in the province, with the Liberals barely holding on to three.

On these numbers (excluding the city and NL results, however), the Conservatives win 142 seats to 120 for the NDP and 40 for the Liberals. The Bloc would win five seats and the Greens would retain one.

The Tories win 17 seats in British Columbia, 27 in Alberta, 22 in the Prairies, 70 in Ontario, three in Quebec, two in Atlantic Canada, and one in the North. As usual, it is the combination of the West and Ontario that keeps the Conservatives on top.

The NDP wins 13 seats in British Columbia, one in Alberta, four in the Prairies, 25 in Ontario, 60 in Quebec, 16 in Atlantic Canada, and one in the North.

The Liberals win five seats in B.C., two in the Prairies, 11 in Ontario, seven in Quebec, 14 in Atlantic Canada, and one in the North.

As mentioned, the top-line and regional numbers add to the general picture that is forming about where the parties stand throughout the country. But the sub-regional ones paint a slightly different landscape. While caution must be used with the small samples, they suggest that the NDP is not making the inroads it needs to make in Saskatchewan and that the party is poised to do exceptionally well in Newfoundland and Labrador. The Conservatives are still in play in Vancouver and Toronto, but are being challenged more and more in the Ontario capital.

Environics gives us some interesting numbers to mull over the Canada Day weekend.

Ontario PC majority in new Environics poll

Environics released their latest numbers from Ontario, indicating that the Progressive Conservatives hold a wide-lead over the second-place New Democrats. But with the Liberals dropping so much, they risk being reduced to their enclave of Toronto.

Environics was last in the field Apr. 10-13, and since then the PCs have remained steady at 37% support.

The New Democrats have dropped two points to 28%, while the Liberals are also down two points to 25%.

The only party gaining, then, is the Green Party, up four points to 10%.

Perhaps this is a statistical fluke or a rejection of the Liberal government and its NDP support. But there is little to suggest why the Greens would be making such important gains (they had less than 3% support in the last election).

The race is a tight three-way contest in the GTA, where the Liberals have dropped five points to 32% support. The PCs are down three points to 31%, while the NDP is up three points to 27%. The Greens are up five to 10%.

In the rest of Ontario, the Tories are up two points to 41% while the NDP is down five points to 29%. The Liberals are up one point to 21% and the Greens are up two to 9%.

Interestingly, Environics included the 2011 election's results in the breakdown of the GTA and the rest of Ontario. Compared to the last vote, the Liberals have dropped 12 points in both regions, while the NDP is up six points in the GTA and five points in the rest of the province. The PCs are mostly holding steady - unchanged in Toronto but up two points elsewhere.

With these numbers, the Progressive Conservatives win a majority government of 61 seats, with the NDP forming the Official Opposition with 30 seats. The Liberals win 15 seats and the Greens win one.

Before anyone gets too excited, note that the Greens have increased their support by more than three times in this poll. That is almost certainly a huge inflation of their real support and especially the support they would get on a hypothetical election day. But at 10%, they do reach the threshold of being able to win a seat.

The PCs win 21 seats in eastern and central Ontario, 22 in Hamilton/Niagara and southwestern Ontario, 16 in Toronto and the surrounding area, and two in northern Ontario.

The NDP wins one seat in eastern Ontario, 11 in and around Toronto, nine in Hamilton/Niagara and southwestern Ontario, and nine in the northern part of the province.

The Liberals win two seats in eastern and central Ontario and 13 in and around Toronto.

The results of this poll are quite horrific for the Liberals. It would appear that the party has never scored 25% support since at least before 2003. They have been between 26% and 28% several times, but not even in the dog days of mid-2011 did Dalton McGuinty's party sink so low.

However, Ontario has been a bit of a confusing province lately. Polls have disagreed with one another wildly, so it is quite possible we will see another poll in the coming days putting the Liberals in second place. After all, this survey had a rather large margin of error of +/- 4.4%, and with Nanos also usually polling around 500 people the level of disparity between the polls is perhaps not so surprising.

Nevertheless, the Liberals have had a run of bad polls. It is a good thing for them that they will not be facing the electorate this year, though Dalton McGuinty has come back from this kind of deficit before.

Federal NDP closes gap in Ontario

Last week, two national polls and two federal provincial polls were released indicating that the New Democrats and Conservatives continue to be running almost neck-and-neck in national voting intentions. Perhaps more significantly, however, they show that the gap between the NDP and the Tories has shrunk to between four and zero points in the important battleground province of Ontario.

Ipsos-Reid's hybrid telephone/online poll puts the Conservatives ahead with 37% support nationally, with the New Democrats standing at 35%.

Since Ipsos-Reid was last in the field Apr. 3-5, the Conservatives have picked up three points while the NDP has picked up two. The Liberals have dropped two points to 19%, where they stood on election night in May 2011.

The Bloc Québécois stands at 5% support while the Greens are at 3%.

In Ontario, the Conservatives are down five points to 36%, putting them only one point up on the NDP. They have picked up eight points and sit at 35% support, while the Liberals are down four to 23%. This is a horse race.

The Conservatives lead in Alberta with 63% (+4), British Columbia with 51% (+14), the Prairies with 49% (+8), and Atlantic Canada with 38% (+17). 

The New Democrats lead with 45% in Quebec (+4) and trail in second to the Conservatives in the Prairies (37%, +3), British Columbia (33%, -6), and Alberta (19%, -2).

The Liberals are running second in Atlantic Canada with 35% (+4) while the Bloc is second in Quebec with 23% (-5).

With the results of this poll, the Conservatives win 150 seats to 114 for the New Democrats, 40 for the Liberals, and four for the Bloc Québécois. While the NDP and Liberals could combine to out-vote the Tories, they would be one seat short of an outright majority.

The Conservatives win 27 seats in British Columbia, 27 in Alberta, 19 in the Prairies, 61 in Ontario, three in Quebec, 11 in Atlantic Canada, and two in the North.

The New Democrats win eight seats in British Columbia, one in Alberta, seven in the Prairies, 32 in Ontario, 60 in Quebec, five in Atlantic Canada, and one in the North.

The Liberals win one seat in British Columbia, two in the Prairies, 13 in Ontario, eight in Quebec, and 16 in Atlantic Canada.

Environics' telephone survey, meanwhile, pegged NDP support at 36%, up four points on the Conservatives. But like the Ipsos-Reid poll, this puts the gap between the NDP and Conservatives within the margin of error. Taking these two polls together, this indicates that the two parties are most likely almost tied.

The firm was last in the field Mar. 6-18, before the NDP's leadership convention. The trends, then, point to what sort of effect Mulcair has had on the party's support levels.

And that means a six-point national gain for the NDP, while the Conservatives are up two. The Liberals have fallen one point to 19%, while the Greens stand at 7% and the Bloc at 6%.

Again, Ontario shows a close race. The Conservatives still lead with 36%, up two points, but the NDP is up six points to 32%. The Liberals are down one to 26%. We are seeing the Tories and NDP vote levels converging while the Liberals fall away.

Elsewhere, the New Democrats lead with 45% in Quebec (+11) and 43% in British Columbia (+5), while they trail the Conservatives in Atlantic Canada (31%, -9), the Prairies (30%, -1), and Alberta (26%, +7).

The Conservatives lead with 54% in Alberta (-4), 44% in the Prairies (+1), and 38% in Atlantic Canada (+10) and stand in second in B.C. with 29% (-1).

The Bloc Québécois is second in Quebec with 25% (-5). The Liberals place third or worse in every part of the country.

A note about the Green results in the Prairies and Atlantic Canada: they are implausibly high, but the samples are small and the implications on the results are negligible.

Despite the four point NDP lead, the Conservative advantage in Ontario gives the party the plurality of seats nationwide: 139 seats to 124 for the NDP, 39 for the Liberals, five for the Bloc, and one for the Greens. This time, the NDP and Liberals can combine for a majority.

The Conservatives win 10 seats in British Columbia, 26 in Alberta, 21 in the Prairies, 56 in Ontario, four in Quebec, 21 in Atlantic Canada, and one in the North.

The New Democrats win 20 seats in British Columbia, two in Alberta, seven in the Prairies, 27 in Ontario, 60 in Quebec, seven in Atlantic Canada, and one in the North.

The Liberals win five seats in British Columbia, 23 in Ontario, six in Quebec, four in Atlantic Canada, and one in the North.

Finally, buried in the results of the provincial voting intentions of Quebecers and Ontarians, Forum found that the federal voting intentions of these Canadians match closely with the conclusions of Ipsos-Reid and Environics.

In Ontario, Forum finds the NDP and Conservatives tied with 35%, with the Liberals at 22% and the Greens at 5%. Since their last poll of Apr. 24-25, the NDP is up four points while the Tories are down three and the Liberals six. But despite the neck-and-neck race, the Conservative vote is more efficient and delivers 62 seats to the Tories, with 32 going to the NDP and 12 to the Liberals.

This may sound surprising, but Forum finds that the Conservatives hold a substantial lead in eastern Ontario and leads in suburban Toronto and northern Ontario. The two parties are tied in southwestern Ontario (where the Conservatives have an incumbency advantage). The NDP only leads in the 416 area code.

In Quebec, the NDP leads with 39% (-3) to 21% for the Bloc (-2), 17% for the Liberals (+1), and 16% for the Conservatives (-1). This delivers 56 seats to the NDP, 10 to the Liberals, five to the Conservatives, and four to the Bloc Québécois.

These four polls show how the voting intentions of Canadians may be changing, but also how they are not. The New Democrats are back in front in Quebec in a big way and seem safe in the province under the leadership of Thomas Mulcair. The party is also doing well enough in every other part of the country to be running neck-and-neck with the Conservatives in any given poll. Improving fortunes in Ontario is a big positive for the NDP.

On the other hand, their vote in other regions is looking somewhat shaky. The Conservatives seem to have rebounded somewhat in British Columbia, while the NDP lead in Atlantic Canada is now in question. This is problematic for the New Democrats, as a strong showing in British Columbia is the second plank in any drive for 24 Sussex. Gains in Ontario should be the difference-maker, not the key to an NDP government.

Perhaps that will change and the New Democrats will bank on winning Ontario and Quebec instead of making gains out West. That might be a winning strategy, but it is a big might.

What can be said with confidence is that the NDP is on the up-swing. If we take the best and worst regional seat projections from these four polls, the Conservative range ends up at between 126 and 165 seats while the New Democrats get between 105 and 129 seats. While the high Conservative and low NDP ranges are similar to their current standings, the Conservative range points to losses (even of only a single seat), while the NDP range points to gains.

One seat the Conservatives might lose soon is Etobicoke-Centre, due to the results of the 2011 election being thrown out by the courts. If the result is not appealed, or if the appeal is defeated, a by-election will take place. It is difficult to forecast how the voters would react to this re-run (the Conservatives are hoping that they will react negatively against their democratic choice being rejected by a judge, to paraphrase their messaging), but using the projection model the Liberals win the riding by one point with the results of the Ipsos-Reid and Forum polls, and six points with the results of the Environics numbers.

If a by-election does take place in the next six months, it will add a little bit of interest to what might be a rather quiet summer and fall. It will also be a big test. Are voters angry at the Conservatives? Can the Liberals show they are still a party that can win? And is the NDP truly making inroads in Ontario? The polls are currently answering yes, no, and yes to these questions, but the results of a real vote might be more revealing.

PCs lead, NDP second in Ontario

Considering the Ontario Liberal government could (but probably won't) fall as soon as Tuesday, it comes as no surprise that two polls have been released within the last 24 hours. The results, however, are surprising: Tim Hudak's Progressive Conservatives are in the lead, trailed not by the Liberals but by Andrea Horwath's NDP.

Since Forum was last in the field on Mar. 28, the Tories have held steady with 34% support. The New Democrats, however, are up one point to 31%, moving them ahead of the Liberals who are down two points to 28%.

The Greens are unchanged at 5% support.

It is a very close three-way race. The PCs lead in eastern Ontario with 43% (unchanged) and southwestern Ontario with 37% (+2), and are tied for the lead in the GTA with 32% (+1).

The New Democrats, meanwhile, lead in northwestern Ontario with 57% (+14), northern Ontario with 40% (+9), northeastern Ontario with 37% (+8), and the 905 Area Code with 35% (+3).

The Liberals are ahead in the 416 Area Code with 37% (-7) and are tied for first with 32% (-4) in the GTA.

Note that Forum combines the 416 and 905 results to get their GTA total, while northeastern and northwestern Ontario combine to give the northern Ontario total.

Each party has their region of strength, but each party is also competitive in every part of the province. This makes the potential seat result unpredictable. A few points here, a few points there, and dozens of seats could be swapped.

Environics, which has not released an Ontario poll since the election, agrees with the general trend that Forum has identified. In their polling, the Tories lead with 37%, followed by the NDP at 30%, the Liberals at 27%, and the Greens at 6%.

Though it is still a close three-way race, according to Environics the Tories are much better positioned. However, this survey is half the size of Forum's so the margin of error (+/- 4.5%) is quite large.

Because of the smaller sample, Environics split the regional results into the GTA and the rest of Ontario only.

In the GTA, the Liberals lead with 37% to 34% for the PCs and 24% for the NDP. This is not exactly what Forum found, as they pegged the Liberals and Tories at 32% to 31% for the NDP. But with the MOE we're looking at a tight contest either way.

In the rest of Ontario, the Tories hold a wide lead - as should be expected. They are ahead with 39%, followed closely by the NDP at 34%. The Liberals are well behind with 20%.

This is in general agreement with Forum, as outside of the GTA the Liberals only scored between 23% and 27%, while the NDP was between 26% and 40% and the PCs between 30% and 43%.

In terms of raw seat numbers, these two polls make no difference for the New Democrats. But context is very important.

With Forum's close race, the Progressive Conservatives win 48 seats to 31 for the NDP and 28 for the Liberals. That means a minority government of some kind. Would it be a Hudak minority propped up by the Liberals, or an NDP-Liberal coalition?

But with Environics' seven-point lead for the PCs, the Tories win 55 seats and a slim majority. The NDP still wins 31 seats but are left without much influence in the legislature. The Liberals are reduced to 21 seats.

But with this kind of confused jumble of a three-way race, anything could happen. The last campaign demonstrated how fickle voters can be, with the Tories having squandered a wide lead in a matter of weeks. While the PCs have committed to voting down the budget, the New Democrats should take a lesson from Tim Hudak's experience last fall. They might be riding high now, but what about after four weeks of campaigning?

It seems very likely that the NDP will support the budget after getting a few concessions from Dalton McGuinty. Only about one-third of people polled are open to having another election, and the parties themselves are heavily in debt from the last campaign. But the brinksmanship is on, and while it seems a fair bet that Ontarians won't be going to the polls this spring, it seems just as unlikely that the government will survive until 2015.

Conservatives and NDP draw even, Tories win on points

A new poll has caused a bit of stir today, as Environics puts the Conservatives and the New Democrats dead even at 30% apiece. But the NDP needs to be ahead of the Conservatives in some key regions in order to win as many seats as the governing party.

Environics has not been in the field, or at least has not released a poll, since well before the 2 May 2011 vote. Being able to look at the trends would have been helpful in this case.

The Conservatives and NDP are tied with 30% support each, a mark more of Conservative decline than NDP strength. Resilience, however, is another thing entirely as the party has generally held steady since last year's election.

The Liberals are stuck at 20% while the Bloc Québécois stands at 8% nationally, ahead of the Greens who sit at 7% support.

Somewhat problematic is the large result for the Others: 5%. Anything over 1% is unlikely in a general election, putting the remaining 4% in limbo. Adding that 4% to the Conservative result would give us a poll more in line with what other surveys have shown, but it seems like a big stretch to hand one party all of that extra support. If that "Other" result splits 50/25/25 between the Tories and the two main opposition parties, we're still looking at a very close result. Even if it splits 75/25 between the Tories and the NDP, this is still a within-the-margin-of-error gap between the two parties.

The Conservatives are leading in Ontario with 34%, Alberta with 58%, and in the Prairies with 43%. They are trailing in second in British Columbia (30%) and Atlantic Canada (28%).

The New Democrats are ahead in Quebec with 34%, British Columbia with 38%, and Atlantic Canada with 40%, while trailing in second with 19% in Alberta and 31% in the Prairies.

The Liberals are not ahead in any region, but stand in second in Ontario at 27%, one point up on the NDP. The Bloc Québécois trails the NDP with 30% in Quebec.

There is nothing outlandish with these regional results. The NDP has led in several polls on both coasts, and a close race hovering around 30% between the NDP and the BQ seems to be the norm of late. A weaker Conservative result in Ontario has also been a recent feature of polling, while there is nothing unusual in Alberta and the Prairies. In other words, no red flags in this poll.

What might explain this big Conservative decline? It is tempting to point to robo-calls and an impending austerity budget. But this Environics poll needs to be confirmed by some other surveys before we can come to any conclusions, as it stands alone at this point. It is, however, the newest set of data on record (outside of Quebec, at least, see below) so it could be the start of a new trend. The choice of leader at this weekend's NDP convention may or may not clinch this new state of affairs.

However, the NDP vote is not nearly as efficient as that of the Conservatives, who still take the lion's share of seats in Western Canada and almost half of them in Ontario. With these levels of support, the Conservatives win 128 seats to 104 for the New Democrats, 58 for the Liberals, 17 for the Bloc Québécois, and one for the Greens.

It is noteworthy, however, that despite the Bloc returning to official party status the NDP and Liberals are strong enough to combine for a majority government without needing the support of the Bloc and all the political baggage that brings.

The Conservatives win 14 seats in British Columbia, 27 in Alberta, 19 in the Prairies, 52 in Ontario, four in Quebec, 11 in Atlantic Canada, and one in the north. They would likely win 143 seats in the 338-seat House of Commons, increasing their share from 41.6% to 42.3%.

The New Democrats win 16 seats in British Columbia, one in Alberta, six in the Prairies, 24 in Ontario, 45 in Quebec, 11 in Atlantic Canada, and one in the north. That would be upped to 113 seats in the expanded Commons, but their share would decrease from 33.8% to 33.4%.

The Liberals win five seats in British Columbia, three in the Prairies, 30 in Ontario, nine in Quebec, 10 in Atlantic Canada, and one in the north. They would likely win 63 seats on the larger map, their share decreasing from 18.8% to 18.6%. The NDP and Liberals could still combine for a Bloc-less majority, however.

With the convention this weekend, this is certainly a bit of good news for the New Democrats. But they still have a ways to go. They need to be doing much better in Ontario, where they still trail in third, in order to surpass the Conservatives.

Quebec, however, remains key. Though the NDP and Liberals could get away with these 17 Bloc seats, the NDP would do far better to have those 13 BQ gains in their own hands. And, as a more recent CROP poll indicates, things are still very much in the air.

CROP was last in the field 17-21 February 2012, and since then the New Democrats have slipped two points to 29% in Quebec. They still hold a lead over the Bloc Québécois, however, though the party has gained four points to hit 28% support.

The Liberals are also up, gaining two points to reach 22% while the Conservatives are down three points to 19% support.

The New Democrats are ahead in the Montreal region with 31%, but that is still a drop of two points since mid-February. They are trailing in second to the Bloc Québécois among francophones (30%, -1) and in the regions of Quebec (28%, -3).

The Bloc Québécois has 33% support among francophones, up four points since the last poll, and hold a wide lead in the regions with 36%, a gain of nine points.

The Liberals lead among non-francophones with 40%, a gain of six points. They are also running second in Montreal (25%, +3) and in Quebec City (24%, +7), which is a bit of a shocker.

The Conservatives are ahead in Quebec City with 33% (-4) and place second among non-francophones with 28% (-4).

With these results, the Bloc Québécois would win 27 seats to 22 for the NDP, 15 for the Liberals, and 11 for the Conservatives. This is a very different result from Environics's poll, and would transform the projection for their national numbers to 135 Conservatives, 81 New Democrats, 64 Liberals, and 27 Bloc MPs. This means the NDP and Liberals could combine for only 145 seats, short of a majority and so requiring the support of the Bloc Québécois.

This is why Quebec is so important to the New Democrats. If they are to form a government on their own, they absolutely need Quebec before they can even think of making the gains required in the rest of the country. If they are to form a government in tandem with the Liberals, they still need to hold on to the bulk of their Quebec seats, otherwise the Bloc wins too many for the two parties to govern without the support of the politically toxic BQ.

Poll after poll indicates that Thomas Mulcair is the NDP's best hope for Quebec, but there is nothing that says that a Brian Topp or a Peggy Nash, for instance, would not be able to gain traction in the province over the next three years. But the question with them is whether they can gain the support the party needs in the province, whereas Mulcair merely has to maintain the support that polls indicate he would have. The easier task is obvious.

Redford/McGuinty vs. Smith/Hudak

Ontario and Alberta are two important provinces in a period of political flux.

The governing Alberta Tories have a new leader at the helm in Alison Redford, who hails from the more progressive side of the Progressive Conservative Party. She has a feisty challenger in Danielle Smith, leader of the right-wing Wildrose Party.

In Ontario, the Liberals were re-elected but with only a minority government, and the province could be heading to the polls at any time. Premier Dalton McGuinty’s main opponent at Queen’s Park, Tim Hudak, comes from the more conservative wing of the Ontario’s PCs.

Two provinces with premiers from different parties, and yet they have a lot in common.

You can read the rest of the article on The Huffington Post Canada website here.

What Alison Redford and Dalton McGuinty don't have in common, however, is their standing in the polls. The most recent numbers out of Alberta, reported last week by the Calgary Herald, show that the Alberta Tories are outpacing their rivals by 32 points.

The Environics telephone poll shows that the Progressive Conservatives have dropped only three points since July, and lead with 51%. Redford wasn't the party leader at that point, so that is good news for her.

The Wildrose Party is up three points to 19%, while the NDP is unchanged at 14%. The Liberals have slipped one point to 13%.

Details in the Herald report are slim, but it appears that the NDP is running second in Edmonton with 21%. That falls nicely in line with the most recent data from Lethbridge College and Angus-Reid. Wildrose is running second to the Tories in Calgary, as would be expected.

The seat projection model for Alberta is still in a rudimentary stage, and needs to be revamped entirely. But as it stands, these results would give 81 seats to the Progressive Conservatives, four to the NDP, and two to Wildrose. I imagine, though, that the more sophisticated model, once it is complete, would show a slightly different result.

What we can say confidently is that with 51% and a very divided opposition the Progressive Conservatives have a good shot at a virtual sweep. The NDP is doing well enough to retain, and perhaps even grow, its toehold in Edmonton, while the Liberals are looking to be in trouble. If under Raj Sherman the Alberta Liberals see a drop in support next year, it would be the trifecta of the provincial Liberal decimation in the Prairies after the elections in Manitoba and Saskatchewan.

It is still very, very early going for Alison Redford and this kind of bump is to be expected. Ironically, in the interview I mention in the Huffington Post article, Danielle Smith made the same argument, saying that this kind of honeymoon in the polls comes with the territory of being a new leader. What she could have added is that she knows this by experience, as her party had a bump after she took on the leadership. But Wildrose is now far removed from where it was a year ago.

Last polls of campaign still show PCs dominant, NDP over-achieving in NL

On Tuesday, Newfoundland and Labrador voters are expected to give the Progressive Conservatives their third consecutive mandate since 2003 – and a first under the leadership of Premier Kathy Dunderdale. While there is little doubt about the make-up of the next government in Newfoundland and Labrador, how the opposition parties will fare is the big question heading into election day. 

For the first time in their history, Newfoundland New Democrats are running second in the polls and are on track to form the Official Opposition. The Liberals, who have governed the province for most of its post-Confederation history, are a distant third but may have enough pockets of strength in the rural parts of the island to come out ahead of Lorraine Michael’s NDP.

You can read the rest of the article on The Globe and Mail website here. Complete details of the new projection can be found in the article.

The last two polls of the campaign in Newfoundland and Labrador, from Environics and Corporate Research Associates, show very little change from what MQO Research and NTV/Telelink have found to be the case. In short, the Tories are still well ahead, the New Democrats have a lock on second, and the Liberals are floundering below 20% support.

It's the regional data that is interesting. Environics has NDP and PC support at 47% apiece in St. John's, with the Liberals trailing at 6%. From my estimates of what was gleaned from The Telegram's reports, CRA has support for the PCs at 60% in St. John's, with the NDP at 31% and the Liberals at 9%. Those would, of course, have very different outcomes on election night.

In the rest of Newfoundland and Labrador, Environics has PC support at 54% to 28% for the NDP and 18% for the Liberals. That is actually a very good showing for the New Democrats. CRA broke it down into the west (Labrador, west coast, central Newfoundland) and the east (east and northeast coasts), showing the Progressive Conservatives leading in the west with 57% and in the east with 61%, with the Liberals second in the west (28%) and third in the east (16%). The NDP was third in the west with 15% and second in the east with 23%.

So, what this breaks down to is the Tories dominating everywhere, but that the NDP and Liberals have enough pockets of support to be competitive in several ridings. Where those seats will be will be interesting to watch on Tuesday night.

I don't expect any new numbers to come out, but I will post the final projection for Newfoundland and Labrador on Tuesday morning.

McGuinty down to 54 seats, Aylward to 2

Five polls were released over the last 24 hours, four of them for Ontario and one of them for Newfoundland and Labrador.

Ontario

All four polls in Ontario showed a statistically insignificant gap between the Liberals and the Progressive Conservatives. It's a remarkably close race.

The oldest poll was conducted online by Environics for the Canadian Press between September 26 and 28, interviewing 1,000 people. It found that the Progressive Conservatives stood at 36% to the Liberals' 35%, with the New Democrats trailing at 25% and the Greens at 3%. The poll found the Liberals ahead in Toronto and tied with the PCs in the GTA. The New Democrats were ahead in the north and the Tories in eastern and central Ontario.

The next poll was by Nanos Research for CTV and the Globe and Mail. This telephone poll was conducted on September 28 and 29, and surveyed 600 people. Nanos found the Liberals leading with 37.7% and the Progressive Conservatives trailing with 34.4%. The NDP stood at 25.5% and the Greens at 1.8%. Compared to Nanos's last poll from early September, the Liberals are down 0.4 points and the PCs 0.3 points. The NDP is up 1.2 points, all insignficant.

Then Sun Media released a Léger Marketing poll conducted online on September 28 and 29 and that interviewed 1,012 people. In this poll, the Tories led with 34% to the Liberals' 32%. The New Democrats came in at 29% while the Greens were at 5%. This is a two point drop for the Tories and a one point drop for the Liberals since Léger's mid-September poll, while the NDP picked up three points.

Regionally, Léger found the Tories to be leading in eastern Ontario (38% to the Liberals' 31%) and southwestern Ontario (33% to the NDP's 30%). The Liberals led in Toronto and the GTA (38% to the Tories' 34%) while the New Democrats led in Hamilton (38% to the PCs' 30%) and northern Ontario (39% to the Liberals' 30%).

Finally, Angus-Reid and the Toronto Star released a poll this morning. Conducted online between September 28 and 30 and interviewing 1,002 people, Angus-Reid pegs PC support at 34% with the Liberals at 33% and the NDP at 26%. The Greens trail in fourth with 6%. This is a two point drop for the Tories since Angus-Reid's mid-September poll and a one point gain for the Liberals. The NDP are unchanged.

Regionally, the Tories lead in the 905 (36% to the Liberals' 33%), southwestern Ontario (39% to the Liberals' 32%), eastern Ontario (36% to the Liberals' 30%), and northern Ontario (37% to the NDP's 33%). The Liberals lead in the 416 (46% to the NDP's 27%) while the NDP is ahead in the Hamilton/Niagara region (34% to the Tories' 28%).

It's a lot of new data. Interestingly, all of the online polls show an insignificantly slim lead for the Tories, while the one telephone poll has a less insignificant (but still within the margin of error) lead for the Liberals. Support for the Tories is very consistent, ranging between 34% and 36%. Liberal support is pegged at being between 32% and 38%, a much wider range that means the difference between winning and losing. NDP support is generally solid, at between 25% and 29%.

In terms of trends, this is Environics's first poll of the campaign so they have nothing to tell us on that score. But the other three all show stability for the two main parties, with changes being comfortably within the margin of error. However, they also all show the Tories slipping a little and two of them have the NDP gaining. Taken together, it would appear that Liberal support is solid, PC support is sliding, and NDP support is on the rise.

Regionally, Environics, Léger, and Angus-Reid all put the Liberals ahead in Toronto and running neck-and-neck with the Tories in the GTA. They all show the PCs leading in eastern, central, and southwestern Ontario, while the NDP is ahead in the Hamilton region. Two of the three have the NDP leading in the north, while the other shows a close race. For the smaller sample sizes that regions have, this is pleasantly consistent.

The projection has only moved slightly, however, as these polls have generally fallen on either side of the last set of numbers. The Progressive Conservatives still have a 0.1 point edge (if it can be called that) with 34.2% support. The Liberals follow with 34.1%.

Both parties have dropped 0.4 points since the last projection of September 27.

The New Democrats are up 2.2 points to 25.9%, while the Greens are down 1.5 points to 4.5%.

Only one seat has changed hands, with the Liberals losing it to the New Democrats. This puts the Liberals at a projected 54 seats, the bare minimum for a majority government. With a Liberal Speaker, the legislature would be tied at 53-53 between the government and the opposition.

That opposition is now projected to be made up of 32 Progressive Conservatives and 21 New Democrats.

The one seat that switched hands was in southwestern Ontario. The Liberals are now projected to win 11 in the region, with eight going to the Tories and two to the New Democrats.

At dissolution, the Liberals held 15 seats in the region and the PCs six.

There are enough close races to keep the result up in the air. The Liberals lead in 13 of them and trail in four others, while the PCs lead in four and trail in 10.

This puts the Liberal range at between 41 and 58 seats. The Progressive Conservative range is between 28 and 42 seats.

This means that the Liberals could win anything from a majority to one less seat than the Tories. The odds are still heavily favouring a Liberal government, however.

The New Democrats lead in one close race and trail in four others, meaning they could win between 20 and 25 seats.

Newfoundland and Labrador

One poll from MarketQuest Omnifacts Research was released yesterday for Newfoundland and Labrador, and it was a little controversial.

Taken online and over the telephone between September 28 and 30, the poll of 464 people pegged Progressive Conservative support at 54%, up one point since their last poll earlier in the campaign. The New Democrats were up four points to 33%, while the Liberals fell five points to a woeful 13%.

The controversy erupted when the Liberals questioned the credibility of the poll. But in my experience, when a party starts saying that the numbers in a poll are cooked it is more of a sign that the party itself is cooked. Standard operating procedure is usually to claim that "I don't pay attention to the polls."

Many polling firms employ people with former ties to political parties and governments, and governments are often clients. It's just how it goes, and it seems unlikely that a parent company would sabotage its polling firm's credibility by putting out numbers which can be shown to be false on election day. How easily people are ready to believe that professionals are capable of lying, cheating, and breaking every ethical code in the book for marginal partisan gain is, frankly, depressing.

On that cheery note, let's take a look at how this poll has shifted the projection. The Progressive Conservatives are now projected to take 53.8% of the vote, up 0.8 points since the last projection of September 21.

The New Democrats are up 4.1 points to 32.8%, while the Liberals are down 4.8 points to 13.2%.

With this shift in support, the Liberals have dropped two seats to the Tories. The Progressive Conservatives are now projected to win 42 seats, with the New Democrats taking four and the Liberals two.

The PC gains come in the regions of the Avalon and Burin Peninsulas and the main part of Newfoundland.

The Progressive Conservatives are now projected to win eight seats in the Avalon and Burin Peninsulas (excluding St. John's), with one seat going to the NDP. In the rest of Newfoundland, the Tories are projected to win 19 seats and the Liberals and NDP one apiece.

In these two regions, the Progressive Conservatives held 27 of the seats at dissolution, while the Liberals held three. That score is still 27 for the PCs, but the Liberals are down to one and the NDP stands at two.

There are only a few projected close races at this point. The Tories lead in one of them and trail in another. The Liberals lead in one of their own, while the NDP trails in one.

This puts the Progressive Conservative range at between 41 and 43 seats. The New Democrat range is now between four and five seats, while the Liberals are projected to win between one and two seats.

In other words, it appears that the NDP are well positioned to form the Official Opposition.

It should be an exciting week. Prince Edward Island is heading to the polls on Monday, while Manitoba votes on Tuesday. There may be another poll out of Manitoba before that happens.

Ontario goes to the polls on Thursday, and I suspect we will hear from every firm at least once before that happens. Newfoundland and Labrador then votes next Tuesday, and I have an inkling we could have three or four more polls out of the province before then. That would be welcome, as we have only heard from MQO Research since the campaign began

Final projections will be posted on the day of each province's vote. Post-mortems may have to wait until after the Newfoundland and Labrador vote, but I am very curious to see how the projection model performs. PEI, Newfoundland and Labrador, and Manitoba are all small provinces which makes things more unpredictable. Newfoundland and Labrador has the NDP in uncharted territory and Manitoba is incredibly close. Ontario is even closer, so plenty of surprises could still be in store.