[OTTAWA – June 18, 2009] EKOS continues to offer seat projections based on its opinion polling from time to time. The projections are based on national, regional and in some cases sub-regional polling projected onto the results of the last election. They do not pretend to predict individual ridings.

That having been said, the projections do give us some idea what kind of parliament we might expect if an election were held in the current political environment.

These latest projections emphasize once again how closely poised the two leading parties are at the moment. Neither party could go into an election right now confident of victory. The chances of a majority for either party is currently about the same as a major snowstorm in June – that is to say, not impossible but extremely unlikely.

Viewed from the perspective of the last election, just eight months ago, however, the seat projections suggest a major shift. The Liberals, who suffered their worst drubbing ever last October (in terms of popular vote if not seats) are currently slightly more likely than the Conservatives to form a government,

This change in fortunes is largely built on renewed Liberal strength and a Conservative collapse in Quebec as well as a Liberal revival in Ontario at the expense of both the NDP and the Conservatives. The Liberals currently appear to be slipping somewhat in British Columbia, which tends to show more strongly for the Liberals in polls than in the ballot box in any event.

From the perspective of the last election, however, the Liberals are clearly in a period of strong revival. They would gain in the order of 40 seats if an election were held now, mostly at the expense of the Conservatives. The Bloc Québecois and New Democratic Party would both lose seats, but not as substantially.

One imponderable in the current situation: turnout. In the last election, the Liberals apparently suffered not only from the loss of votes to other parties, but also from traditional supporters staying home. If that phenomenon, which in part may reflect the relative strength of the party organizations, were to persist into the next election, the Liberals would underperform these projections, possibly putting them into something like a dead heat with the Conservatives.

EKOS June 11

EKOS June 18

Posted on June 19th, 2009 under Seat Projection • RSS 2.0 feed