Léger Québec Poll

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No big news (on the federal scene, at least) in terms of top-line numbers, but the Tories seem to have retaken the lead in Quebec City, where they were a few points behind the Bloc for several polls in a row. (And that's a long time, since Québec pollsters, the only ones that provide a breakdown for Quebec City, typically poll at most once a month.) Of course, that subsample is very small, but the 12-point lead suggests that the Conservatives now have a good chance of keeping all their Quebec City seats. This is not surprising, considering that they've been back up near their 2008 election levels for a while.

As a result, the Tories take a seat from the Bloc in the aggregate projection:

CON - 147
LIB - 72
BQ - 51
NDP - 38

New EKOS Poll: Flatline

Here is the now bi-weekly EKOS poll. The news? That there is no discernible movement. So little movement that despite this poll counting for over 35% in my projection (due to its huge sample size and the small number of other recent polls), it generated no change. Not even regional changes that canceled out! Nada. So for the third time in a row, the projection is:

CON - 146
LIB - 72
BQ - 52
NDP - 38

New Ipsos

On the heels of a bad Angus poll for the Grits, here's a bad Ipsos poll for them. Just like the Angus poll, this one shows the Tories receding from their October highs, so the main beneficiary of the Liberal slump is the NDP. In fact, this Ipsos poll has the Dippers at a high 19% nationally (just 5 behind the Grits), an excellent 21% in Ontario, and a whopping 34% in BC.

In the aggregate predictions, these results made the NDP take back a seat in Ontario from the Tories, but they lost the Saskatchewan seat that they had just gained yesterday. Thus, no change in the national numbers:

CON - 146
LIB - 72
BQ - 52
NDP - 38

New Angus Reid Poll

Now that EKOS is bi-weekly, updates will come even less often... Here's the latest Angus, which shows the Grits at a disastrous 23% - down below Dion election levels, to Dion coalition levels...

Accordingly, in the aggregate projection, the Liberals lose 3 seats. Those losses come mainly in Québec, due to the Bloc's strong result in this poll. I'm guessing, though, that this Bloc resurgence is just statistical noise, but we'll have to wait and see.

CON - 146
LIB - 72
BQ - 52
NDP - 38

Bad news for the Liberals, who are down to their lowest projection (tied to October 29), and who are the only party projected to lose seats. Fortunately for them, all of the other parties' projected gains are tiny, and with the Holidays and the Olympics coming, the earliest an election campaign could get underway is probably in March 2010.

November Nanos

The November Nanos is out, and finally gives us some confirmation of what EKOS has been observing for the past few weeks: the Tories are now back to where they were in 2008. This comes after a few weeks of being slightly above that level, and flirting with (though not quite getting to, at least according to my projections) a majority.

As usual, relative to EKOS, Nanos' figures scale up the support of all parties at the expense of the Greens, with an extra little bump for the Liberals. It's interesting to note that while this week's EKOS and Nanos both show the Bloc at 35.6%, EKOS has it at 8.8% nationally, while Nanos shows 9.3%. The latter probably takes into account that Québec turnout is typically slightly higher than national turnout at general elections.

Very little change in the aggregate projection, though we now get nice round numbers for the top three parties:

CON - 145
LIB - 75
BQ - 50
NDP - 38

The CPC's rise in Atlantic Canada lagged its rise in Ontario by a few weeks. Now that the Tory wave seems to be subsiding in Ontario (I believe they got as high as 58 seats at one point), one can ask whether the same will occur in Atlantic Canada in the coming weeks.

Weekly EKOS

In the end, 3/4 ridings were "holds" on Monday's by-elections, if you count Cumberland... as a hold. I'll go out on a limb and say that Montmagny... would also have been a hold given general election level turnout. Indeed, the Tories carried Roberval... by 27% in the 2007 by-election, only to win it by just 4% in the 2008 general election, while in the case of St-Hyacinthe..., they went from losing by 5% to 26%. While there was a large swing against the Tories in Québec between September 2007 and October 2008, it wasn't nearly as large as 21-23%. My guess is that relative to the Bloc, the Tories get a 5-10 point bump in rural Québec by-elections.

It's been two very quiet weeks on the polling front: only EKOS has put out new polls during this time! Here is the most recent one. The new aggregate projection is:

CON - 145
LIB - 75
BQ - 51
NDP - 37

This is the lowest that the Tories have been in the past 5 weeks, though the main beneficiary of this decline has been the NDP, whose popularity increased in BC and the Prairies, and not the Liberals, who are still mired at Dion levels. Counting both independents elected in 2008 as Conservatives (since they align themselves that way in the House of Commons), here are the changes since 2008 in terms of voting intentions and seats:

CON: -0.1%, 0 seat
LIB: +0.3%, -2 seats
BQ: -1.4% in Québec, +2 seats
NDP: -1.8%, 0 seat

The storyline: very, very little change. The Liberals are losing seats due to weakness in Atlantic Canada, while the Bloc is gaining seats due to the Tory vote becoming less efficient in Québec. Indeed, polls with a regional breakdown all suggest that Conservative support is less concentrated around Quebec City than in 2008, which helps the Bloc. The NDP and Conservatives trade seats in Ontario (Dippers down) and BC (Tories down).

By-Elections Tomorrow

The projection model on this website is not designed to project by-elections, whose results are rather unpredictable due to low turnout and a paucity of polls just before election day, among other things. That said, the model is currently showing all 4 ridings as "holds" (counting the Conservatives winning Cumberland--Colchester--Musquodoboit Valley as a hold), though New Westminster--Coquitlam is close, so the Tories have a chance to take a seat from the NDP. Also, the departure of popular Bloc incumbent Paul Crête could allow the Tories to take Montmagny--L'Islet--Kamouraska--Rivière-du-Loup.

Given their current numbers, the Liberals are probably happy that they do not have any chance of winning any of the by-elections, so they don't have a way to underperform.

Weekly EKOS: Conservative Retreat?

The Tories have lost some ground in both Ontario and Québec over the past week according to this week's EKOS poll. Is this just a statistical blip, or has Ignatieff finally turned the corner? Maybe we will find out next week...

For now, not much change in the aggregate projection:

CON - 148
LIB - 74
BQ - 52
NDP - 34

The projection has now been quite stable for four weeks, with the Conservatives at the door of a majority (they never actually got there though, topping out at 153), and the Liberals squarely in Dion territory.