DAILY TRACKING – SEPTEMBER 30, 2008

LIBERALS GET SOME MOJO BACK; TORY MAJORITY SLIPPING AWAY

[OTTAWA – September 30, 2008] – After a difficult start on the campaign trail, in the media and in the polls, the Liberal brand has begun to re-assert itself in Ontario, Quebec and Atlantic Canada. The race has tightened somewhat and the Conservatives have fallen back short of majority territory – something that many voters, especially in Ontario, seem to want.

“The race in Ontario began tightening markedly last week,” said EKOS President Frank Graves. “Now the Liberals appear to be eking out a small lead.“

There is evidence of a “re-coil” impulse by some voters against the idea of a Conservative majority, particularly in Ontario, where almost a quarter of voters say they would reconsider their vote choice if they were sure the Tories were headed to majority. These “re-coil” voters are mostly now sitting with the Greens and the NDP, and if they started to move, the Liberals would be the principal beneficiaries by far.

Meanwhile, the Liberal Party has re-asserted itself in Quebec in its traditional redoubts. The Liberals are now essentially level-pegging with the Conservatives, both well behind the Bloc Québécois. However, that may be enough for the Liberals to hold onto the seats they already have there, and potentially make small gains.

In Atlantic Canada, too, the Liberals are once again competitive.

In most of Western Canada, however, the Liberal Party continues to languish in third place, though the Greens no longer threaten to eclipse them in British Columbia as seemed possible just ten days ago.

“The Liberals’ gains, though modest, are significant, because they maintain their lead nationally over the third place NDP, who are running well by historic standards,” said Graves. “Meanwhile the gap between the Liberals and the first-place Conservatives has begun to narrow, though not enough to make them a serious threat to Conservative victory.”

The Liberals seem to be drawing some of this recent support from wayward Liberals, who had moved into the Green camp in the second week of the campaign, or were sitting on the sidelines as undecideds, and have now plunged back in behind the Liberals.

“It is worth noting that the Liberal Party, even with these first signs of resilience, is still tracking at historic lows,” said Graves. “However, after weakening dramatically in the weeks before and after the election was called, Liberal support plateaued, and has now begun a gentle drift into more familiar territory. Whether this can be sustained may turn on Stéphane Dion’s debate performance and the capacity of the Liberal ground campaign in the remaining weeks 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 in the October 14th election.

Daily Tracking of Federal Vote Intention

National Federal Vote Intention

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

Likelihood of Changing Vote Intention

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

Daily Tracking of Likelihood of Changing Vote Intention

Blocking a Conservative Majority

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?

Blocking a Conservative Majority

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?

Vote Switching

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

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 26, 27, 28, and 29.

In total, 2,296 Canadians responded to the survey over this period. The margin of error associated with this rolling sample is +/-2.0 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.