NDP in dead heat with Conservatives

The NDP, which chose Quebec MP Thomas Mulcair as its new leader in March, scores 47 per cent of support in the province in the latest Léger Marketing survey.

The Gazette:

Montreal - The NDP is now tied with its ideological rival, the Conservative Party, for voter support across Canada even though Prime Minister Stephen Harper and his troops won a majority government in last year’s federal election, the survey conducted for The Gazette and Le Devoir by Léger Marketing reveals.

The NDP comes out with 33 per cent of voter intention and the Conservatives with 32 per cent when the percentage of undecided, unwilling to vote and unwilling to answer are distributed among all the parties, the poll finds.

The Liberal Party is a distant third at 19 per cent, unchanged since it took 18.9 per cent of the vote in the May 2011 election. The Green Party places fourth at eight per cent, roughly where it has polled in the past outside of elections, Dallaire said.

“We see that support for the Conservatives is ... down nearly eight points since the last election,” he said. “So it’s a fairly significant drop for them.”

The Conservatives’ tumble began a couple of months ago, he said, adding the timing coincides with public discontent over such things as revelations of fraudulent robocalls pretending to come from Elections Canada and, just this week, revelations of a major cost overrun in the F-35 fighter jet program that was kept quiet before the last election.

The poll was conducted between April 2 and 4. The margin of error is 2.5 per cent, 19 times out of 20.

The next federal election is three years away.

The NDP finds its strongest support in three regions: Quebec, the Atlantic provinces and British Columbia. The Conservatives get their strongest support in Alberta and the other prairie provinces and Ontario.

The Liberal Party of Canada doesn’t lead in any region.

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