New Democratic Party leader Jagmeet Singh speaks during Question Period in the House of Commons on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, on Oct. 2.Blair Gable/Reuters
Jagmeet Singh’s New Democrats could be emerging as the second most popular party at the national level. Yet this might be a mixed blessing for the NDP.
With Pierre Poilievre’s Conservatives poised to win a huge majority government, the NDP and Justin Trudeau’s Liberals are fighting over table scraps of popular support. Whoever wins that fight will have made the best of a very bad lot.
“The Conservatives are cruising toward a crushing majority in Ottawa,” observes polling analyst Philippe Fournier at 338Canada.com. “What we thought were the floors and ceilings for the major parties may need to be revisited.”
In the past, progressive voters would sometimes swing away from the NDP toward the Liberals at election time, to prevent the Conservatives from taking power. But with a Conservative victory seemingly inevitable, and with the NDP and the Liberals essentially tied for distant second, such a swing can no longer be predicted.
Mr. Singh appears to have made some smart decisions since the last election. First, he agreed to stabilize a weak Liberal minority government in exchange for action on his party’s priorities. As a result, we now have a national dental care program and the beginnings of pharmacare.
Then, a month ago, Mr. Singh decided to terminate the supply-and-confidence agreement with the Liberals. How did the public react? The three most recent polls, aggregated at 338Canada.com, offer an interesting, if tentative, verdict.
A Mainstreet poll with a middle field date of Sept. 29 had the NDP up five points from its July poll, to 20-per-cent support, and the Liberals down four points, to 19 per cent. (The poll of 1,091 respondents involved automated calls and had an estimated margin of error of three percentage points, 19 times out of 20.)
The latest iteration of the Nanos four-week rolling poll has the Liberals and NDP tied at 22 per cent. (That poll took place Sept. 6 to 27 with 1,045 respondents and live phone interviews, with a margin of error of three percentage points, 19 times out of 20.)
An Abacus poll with a middle field date of Sept. 22 has the Liberals at 21 per cent and the NDP at 19 per cent. (The online survey had 1,700 respondents with a comparable margin of error of 2.4 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.)
The three polls put the Conservatives at between 42 and 44 per cent.
So three separate polls confirm that the NDP is essentially tied with the Liberals, which is very good news for New Democrats. But both parties are in mortal peril from the Tories.
Consider the Abacus numbers for British Columbia. (Note that regional numbers have a higher margin of error because of a smaller sample size.)The NDP is well ahead of the Liberals in the province, with 27-per-cent support versus 15 per cent. But the Conservatives sit at 48 per cent. In the next election, the NDP might take seats from Liberals in B.C. But both parties are likely to lose seats to the Conservatives.
In Ontario, according to Abacus, the Liberals are at 22 per cent and the NDP at 20 per cent. But the Conservatives sit at 46 per cent.
The question is no longer whether the Conservatives will loosen the Liberal grip on the 905, the band of suburban cities surrounding Toronto, named after their area code. The question is how many ridings in Toronto itself the Conservatives will win.
There is no prospect of any orange wave in Quebec, such as the NDP enjoyed under Jack Layton in the 2011 election. The Bloc Québécois is polling strongly and should do well at the next election. It’s even possible, though not yet likely, that the Bloc could form the official opposition, as it did after the 1993 election, if the Liberals and NDP lose enough seats to the Conservatives.
Much is uncertain. Parliament could dissolve in the fall or the spring. With the Liberals in danger of slipping behind the NDP, pressure will surely be mounting on Justin Trudeau from within his own party to resign. There is speculation – and that’s all it is – that the Prime Minister could prorogue Parliament and call on his party to hold a swift leadership race to choose a successor.
Federal politics could get very interesting, as the NDP fights with the Liberals over which will become the least popular major national party in the land.