Duelling Polls: How would Canadians Vote?

Two conflicting polls released in the past couple of days suggest widely different outcomes if an election were held today.

An Harris-Decima poll conducted Feb. 18-28 for the Canadian Press shows the Tories and Liberals tied at 31 per cent each with the NDP at 16 per cent. "It appears that the so-called ‘new normal’ in Canadian politics is a statistical tie between the two main parties,” said pollster Allan Gregg. “Neither one has been able to capture the federalist vote in Quebec; the Conservatives continue to be locked out of the major metropolitan centres, while the same can be said for the Liberals in the Prairies and in most parts of rural Canada.”

These poll results are similar to those of a number of recent polls. http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/article/773840--tories-liberals-both-stalled-poll

On the other hand an Ipsos Reid poll conducted for CanWest and Global National suggests that voters would elect another Tory minority.In that poll the Conservatives enjoyed the support of 37 per cent of voters across the country, followed by the Liberals with 29 per cent and the NDP with 16 per cent.Ipsos surveyed 1,000 Canadians by telephone Feb. 18-22. http://www.montrealgazette.com/story_print.html?id=2628789&sponsor=


The Harris-Decima poll was conducted over a longer period and polled twice as many voters.Given that it is consistent with a number of recent polls the Harper government would be ill-advised to read too much into the results of the Ipsos-Reid poll suggesting that they would coast to an easy victory.

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