More good news for Stephane Dion and his recent leadership victory! The recent EKOS Research Poll for LaPresse and the Toronto Star is reconfirming his early traction as the new Liberal leader and as Her Majesty’s Official Opposition.
Dion’s Liberals have 40.1% support, a 10 point bump compared to the 30.2% they had in the January 2006 election. The Cons are at 33.5% compared to 36.3 % they had at the last election. The NDP are down over 7 points to 10.2% and the Greens are up over 3 points to 7.6% today.
The post convention Liberal bump is to be expected given the media coverage these events generate. Will it last? Time will tell. The Cons better start hoping it is just a short attention span bump and not a change of mind and heart shift to the Liberals by Canadians.
The Cons can rest assured in Alberta where they dominate with 59.5% support. The Greens are strong in Quebec all of a sudden with 12.1%, putting them ahead of the NDP and only 6 points behind the Cons. We still have the Alberta Green support with a counterintuitive 7.2% almost a full point ahead of BC. Go figure!
Some of the details are interesting given the approaching election and the pre-Christmas political entry into the “Red Zone” of election preparedness. Last January when Harper formed government 49% said Canada was heading in the right direction with 26% saying the opposite and 25% saying they did not know. Today Harper is seen as on the right track by a consistent 48%. The dramatic change is today only 10% don’t have an opinion and a full 43% think the Government of Canada is headed in the wrong direction. Momentum is pushing up against the Harper Cons.
As for Driving Issues in an election, comparing the pre-January 2006 election period to now we still see the social issues dominate for health and education but it dropped 10 points to 23%. The #2 issue for Canada is still fiscal issues like the economy and debt and taxes now at 18% but that is down 3 points in the year.
The dramatic emerging trend change in the year is on the environment which is #3 priority, but jumping up 9 points to 15% in the past year. The really scary statistic for campaign planners is the startling changes in the vague “Other” issues category now at 18% up from 4% a year ago. Change is in the air.
The Gomery corruption issue is past. Canadians have moved on. Issues of ethics and accountability in a year fell from 15% to 3% saying it was the most important issue to them in deciding who to vote for. This does not take the Liberals out of the penalty box but the outlook for Dion is promising.
The opinions of who “gets it” in certain key policy areas is where the Conservatives have to worry. They dominate on the fiscal side which is the #2 issue with 48% of Canadians trusting them to offer the best solutions. The decision on Income Trusts I think really helped the Conservatives here. The Liberals trailing way back at 23% support on the fiscal agenda. Guess what the Conservatives will start to reinforce and try to make the ballot box question in the forthcoming election.
The #1 and #4 issues being social policy and foreign policy/Afghanistan, the Liberals dominate with 27% and 38% trusting them respectively. I guess “Steve” and “Dubya” being “an item” does not matter anymore to Canadians.
The #3 issue is the environment and it likely has momentum to grow in importance. Only 9% do not have an opinion on which Party they will support to solve environmental issues. Here the Greens win with 35%, followed by the Liberals at 31% and the Conservatives are at a mere 4% support as the guys who “get” the environmental concerns. The NDP have only 13% support and seem to have lost this issue to the Greens and the Liberals.
Based on perceptions Harper is still “The Man” beating Dion by 4 or 5 points on questions of making the best Prime Minister, best vision of the future of Canada, and best understanding of Canadians. What has to chill the blood of the Harper Cons is he has been the Prime Minister for almost a year and Dion is this close to him after only a week on the job as Leader of the Opposition. OUCH! Change is in the air.
haha, let's just wait and seen. it's funny how you believe in the federal liberal party's principles but not the AB's liberal party's principles. They are nearly identical. Hmmmm, PC by convenience?
ReplyDeleteYou can be sure the Liberals will remind voters of the income trust betrayal during the next election.
ReplyDeleteI wonder how many middle class investors will believe in Harpers integrity this time around? How many Albertans who work for Oil and Gas Royalty Trusts will vote for Harper now?
Yeah, they will vote for the left-leaning 'substanable' economy Dion (who has no business or economic background whatsoever) instead of Harper. Investors are not that stupid.
ReplyDeletePoor Eric: I am an Alberta Progressive Conservative by conviction not convenience - and have been since about 1971.
ReplyDeleteAs for principles, I have great admiration for citizens who came come together under the PC Alberta banner in the ealy 1990's,when Dave Hancock was Party President.
We discussed debated and then agree on a Statement of Principles for the PC Party of Alberta in a grassroots bottom up consultative and inclusive process.
As for the Fed - Alta Libs - to my mind they are nothing like each other, what is your basis for saying they are? I recall Dr. Taft was ruminating openly about changing the Alberta Liberal Party name in the darkest days of the Gomery Inquiry so as not to be associated with corruption within the Montreal segment of the federal party.
My criteria for personal political support has always been the judgement, character and competence of the candidate. Party affiliation is second for me and it is then mostly about platform and the personal intelligence and integrity of the leadership.
I belong to political parties from time to time but do not think that means I have to suspend or subordinate by personal judgement as a result.
I think citizens generally avoid political party membership because they fear they have to toe some party line that may not be consistent with thier own beliefs and values from time to time. In top down charismatic and populist leaderships that expectation of members sometimes happens. I oppose that imposition on individual rank and file party members when ever I can.
I kind of like George Bernard Shaw's observation when he said "If it was not for the unreasonable man there would be no progress at all."
Ken: Got your message re: podcasting, and checked out your site - would love to discuss further. Please contact me at amishbuggyracing at gmail.com
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It's a bit of a slur to call someone who has been a member of the PC Party since 1971 a member by convenience Eric. To be honest, as basically an outside observer, for some of the reasons that Ken has outlined in his post, I'd say that the PCs in Alberta have governed A LOT like the Federal Liberals have governed Canada. The two parties probably have more in common than any of their respective members would care to admit. Both have balanced budgets, cut taxes, invested in health care and education. The list goes on and on. That's because both parties have done decent jobs of responding to the wishes of their electorates. And the wishes of the Alberta electorate is not that different from the wishes of the Canadian electorate generally. People's needs seem to be approximately the same, regardless of political jurisdiction that someone lives in. So the next time you go criticizing the Liberals some of you Conservative die hards, you should ask yourself, aren't you just criticizing your self as well?
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