Room for Breakout Shrinking on Eve of English Debate

[OTTAWA – October 2, 2008] – All the parties are holding to their lanes, and the prospects of any of them making a dramatic shift in the remaining 12 days of the campaign are ebbing away as the number of undecided voters and potential switchers falls.

“The English debate tonight may be the last chance for the leaders to break out of the pattern set in this campaign so far,” said EKOS President Frank Graves, “but it is also something of a faint hope, as Canadians are settling in and getting comfortable with their current vote choice.”

The Conservatives’ dreams of doubling their representation in Quebec, which seemed plausible just three weeks ago, now seem extremely unlikely. The Bloc Québécois is now the commanding leader in Quebec – a position it has held in elections since 1993.

“Last night’s debate was inevitably a four-on-one pile-on the Prime Minister,” Graves said. “He did what he could to look calm and prime ministerial. But that is unlikely to be enough to turn around his prospects in Quebec. Gilles Duceppe, meanwhile, was on home turf, in his native language, and if anything consolidated his party’s support.”

As Conservative strength ebbs in Quebec, and to a less dramatic extent on the West Coast, the party is losing a little of its appeal across income groups. Just two weeks ago, they could boast that they were almost as popular with Canadians making under $40,000 a year income as with those making over $80,000. No more. Conservative supporters are now skewed towards the better-off.

The Liberals continue to track far behind the Conservatives in the latest EKOS tracking poll. At times they have edged abreast of the Conservatives in Ontario, but have been unable to break through. The best prospect for the Liberals to charge ahead from where they are now would be if Canadians believed the Tories were about to form a majority, and the Liberals were able to capture the ABC (Anyone but Conservative) vote. Many New Democrats and Green Party supporters would consider switching in that situation.

But a consensus is emerging among the polls and the media that a Conservative majority is less likely than it seemed at the beginning of the campaign, and that means many voters will not feel they need to make a difficult “tactical” choice to support the Liberals.

That having been said, there are still some “loose fish” among the electorate. Women, and Generation X-ers (25-44 years of age), are less firmly decided than other Canadians. Watch for the parties to hone their pitches on these demographic groups in the last days of the campaign.

Detailed Tables:

National Federal Vote Intention

Q. If a federal election were held tomorrow, which party would you vote for?

Note - The data presented in this chart is based on decided voters only. Our survey also finds that 8% of Canadians say they are undecided and 5% say they do not plan to vote on October 14th.

National Federal Vote Intention

Q. If a federal election were held tomorrow, which party would you vote for?

Tracking Federal Vote Intention

Note – To view daily tracking numbers from throughout the campaign, please download PDF version of this release (link located at the bottom of page)

Tracking Federal Vote Intention in British Columbia

Tracking Federal Vote Intention in Alberta

Tracking Federal Vote Intention in Saskatchewan & Manitoba

Tracking Federal Vote Intention in Ontario

Tracking Federal Vote Intention in Quebec

Tracking Federal Vote Intention in Atlantic Canada

Likelihood of Changing Vote Intention

Q. How likely is it that you will change your mind between now and the federal election?

Tracking Likelihood of Changing Vote Intention

Note – To view daily tracking numbers from throughout the campaign, please download PDF version of this release (link located at the bottom of page)

Strategic Vote Switching

Q. If you KNEW that the Conservatives were about to win a majority government in this election, would you then reconsider your current voting intention?

Tracking Strategic Vote Switching

Strategic Vote Switching

Q. If you KNEW that the Conservatives were about to win a majority government in this election, would you then reconsider your current voting intention?

Where do the “Strategic Switchers” Migrate to?

Q. Which Party do you think you might vote for instead?

Tracking Vote Switching

Methodology:

EKOS’ daily tracking polls are conducted using Interactive Voice Recognition (IVR) technology, which allows respondents to enter their preferences by punching the keypad on their phone, rather than telling them to an operator.

Each weekday evening, a nationally representative sample of Canadians, 18 years of age and older is surveyed. The daily tracking number presented in this report is based on a rolling average of surveys collected September 29 and 30, and October 1.

In total, 3947 Canadians responded to the survey over this period. The margin of error associated with this rolling sample is +/-1.7 percentage points, 19 times out of 20. Please note that the margin of error increases when the results are sub-divided (i.e., error margins for sub-groups such as region, sex, age, income). All the data have been statistically weighted to ensure the samples composition reflects that of the actual population of Canada according to Census data.

Click here to download PDF: election-08-daily-tracking-oct2

Posted on October 2nd, 2008 under National Results • RSS 2.0 feed