Around the Web: How Much Has the NDP Surged?

Update, 4/24, 6:46am: Latest numbers from democraticSPACE included

Riding by Riding has clued me in on the existence of The Mace, another projection blog, which I have now added to my blog roll. I am now aware of 8 websites, including mine, regularly making projection based on polling averages. Links to the 7 others can be found on the left of the page. Here are the latest projections, from most to least recent:

Including Polls Published Friday and Earlier
157 C, 69 L, 39 N, 42 B, 1 I (democraticSPACE)
150 C, 75 L, 40 N, 42 B, 1 I (Canadian Election Watch)
150 C, 76 L, 36 N, 45 B, 1 I (ThreeHundredEight.com)

Including Polls Published Thursday and Earlier
145 C, 74 L, 47 N, 42 B (Too Close to Call)
147 C, 68 L, 49 N, 43 B, 1 I (Riding by Riding)
149 C, 68 L, 52 N, 39 B (LISPOP)
131 C, 73 L, 81 N, 22 B, 1 I (The Mace)

Average of 7 sites: 147 C, 72 L, 49 N, 39 B, 1 I
Average excluding The Mace: 150 C, 72 L, 44 N, 42 B, 1 I

I don't know how The Mace gets to 81 NDP seats, but for the rest, the number of NDP seats is directly correlated with how fast the site depreciates polls:
- LISPOP only included polls released on Thursday.
- Riding by Riding includes earlier polls, but its projection carries a forward looking component that extrapolates from past trends.
- Too Close to Call includes past polls; it has no forward looking component, but depreciates early polls quickly.
- I depreciate past polls more slowly than Too Close to Call.
- ThreeHundredEight.com uses the slowest depreciation.

Everybody agrees that the Liberals are slightly lower than their 2008 result. Apart from The Mace, there is also consensus that the Bloc will suffer moderate losses. Finally, everybody but The Mace and democraticSPACE thinks that the Conservatives are between their 2008 result and the majority threshold.

Calgary Grit has yet to include the very NDP-favourable polls published on Thursday: 150 C, 74 L, 35 N, 48 B, 1 I.

Elsewhere, Election Almanac offers projections for individual national polls. The average of the Friday projection based on Nanos and the three Thursday projections based on EKOS, Ipsos and Forum is: 150 C, 70 L, 52 N, 36 B. EKOS has for its own polls as well, and the latest is 134 C, 82 L, 60 N, 32 B.

Finally, BC Iconoclast's prediction of the final results is 152 C, 67 L, 48 N, 40 B, 1 I.

So how far has the NDP surged? If you believe the Thursday polls, it looks like the NDP is in the 50-60 range, from the mid-30s a week ago. My model is waiting for more confirmation (both of the magnitude of the move - Nanos still had the NDP trailing by 5.5% in Québec - and that the new NDP support holds) before allocating that extra dozen seats to the Dippers. I am particularly interested in seeing new Léger numbers, as it has the best track record in Québec.

P.S. A group called Fair Vote Canada said that based on the Ipsos alone, the Tories would get 201 seats, but the same projection has the Bloc at just 4, which is extremely implausible (it was at 27% in the poll, good for second in Québec). I do not view this as a credible projection.