Canadian Politics Part 2: A Current Snapshot of 2015

Shall the Liberals return as the natural governing party of Canada? Can they gain a majority, or at least a minority of 338 seats, starting from a base of now 37 seats?

On June 30, four by-elections took place across Canada: 2 in Alberta, 2 in Downtown Toronto/Inner Burbs. Notably, the Liberals picked up Trinity-Spadina from the NDP, after Olivia Chow, widow of the late former NDP leader Jack Layton, resigned her seat to run for mayor of Toronto, of which she leads the pack against embattled mayor Rob Ford. It wasn't even close from 2011, as the NDP vote share dropped from 54.5% to 34% while the Liberal vote share increased from 23% to 53.5%. Meanwhile, in Fort McMurray-Athabasca in the Northern Albertan Tar Sands area, the Conservative vote share dropped from 72% to 47%, while the Liberal vote share increased to 35%.

Meanwhile, Angus Reid, the pollster most accurate in the Ontario Election (and generally has a solid reputation) has pinned the latest Federal numbers here for June 12th:

Forum Research on the other hand pinned the numbers at Liberal: 39 Conservative 31 NDP 19, so quite a lot of room for variation between the Liberals and the NDP. Of course, the discrepancies between Canadian Pollsters are notorious - let us not forget EKOS pinned the NDP's numbers at 17 and Ipsos at 30 when they captured 24% - so averages may matter more than individual numbers. But these are the two recent ones, and each could tell an entirely different story of 2015.

And of course, poll numbers can change like the wind across time:

As usual, the Conservatives maintain strong leads in Alberta and the Prairies, having captured 51 of 56 of the seats in those three provinces. Alberta will be reapportioned from 28 to 34 seats. However, the Tories cannot expect to get 67% of the vote to the NDP and Liberal's 17% and 9% respectively another time. With the expanded vote share, the Liberals can expect to make significant inroads in the 3 Centre-Western-Southern ridings in Edmonton, as well as a couple in Central or Northern Calgary (like McCall or Confederation), as they nearly picked up Calgary Centre in the last by-election. The NDP can hope only to pick up Edmonton-Griesbach and Lethbridge at best.

In Sasketchewan and Alberta, the Liberals are once again on the upsurge at the expense of both the Conservatives and NDP. They can make some clear gains inside Winnipeg, while holding onto that 2010 by-election gain in Winnipeg North. Of course, it's possible that voters could rally to the NDP, as they have led the province for the better part of two decades, or that given that government's current unpopularity, that they swing wholesale to the Liberals. In Saskatchewan, where the Liberals would gain is less clear. The new boundaries favor the NDP picking up 3 or 4 seats, but their dropped vote count would make that more difficult. Where the Liberals gain outside of Ralph Goodale's Wascana is unclear, perhaps the Northern Churchill River riding with a large First Nation population?

In British Columbia, if Angus is to be believed, the Liberals are up primarily at the expense of the Conservatives, with the NDP maintaining steady from 2011. BC also increases its seat count from 34 to 40, and hosts a great many of unique battleground areas. The Interior and Northern parts are heavily Conservative, with a few NDP pickups. Victoria and Vancouver Islands are primarily NDP, with some Con ridings and Elizabeth May's Green seat. Vancouver districts with heavily immigrant and affluent urban populations will be primarily Liberal-Conservatives contests. And funny enough, the white working class suburban Vancouver ridings are NDP-Conservative contests. Now running at parity with the NDP, with the Liberals not too far behind, can the Conservatives maintain their seat hegemony, or will they start to lose out on all sides? Is this NDP's support here illusory as it was in the 2013 Provincial Election? Can a surge in Liberal support lead to seats outside of Vancouver?

Over in Atlantic Canada, it seems like an all but foregone conclusion that the Liberals will sweep all but a few of the seats across the provinces. The real question is whether the Liberal's majority lead lasts here or not before we can begin to pick apart which seats the Liberals WONT end up winning.

In Ontario, it appears that the Liberals have a strong formula for success by dominating the Toronto and the GTA, with pockets of support in the East, cities in the Southwest, and new possible strength in the Toronto Exurbs. The Conservatives have to be worried that their gains in this province can be quickly eroded by the Liberals in the GTA/East and by the NDP in the Southwest/North. The NDP, following Trinity-Spadina's loss in the by-election and the 3 Toronto seats lost during the provincial election, has to be worried that they won't lose all of their 2011 Downtown Toronto gains to the Liberals entirely. Will this by-election loss also discourage quality candidates from running in 2015? Ontario's 12 new seats should spice up the mix, but most of the movement will have been in the GTA and Hamilton regions while the rest should be relatively untouched.

Finally to the Belle Province of Québec, the movement appears to be... against the Liberals and toward the NDP. As hinted in the previous post, the Bloc Québecois seems to be hovering at between 15-20% support, and this is generally before people are aware that their new leader is the controversial Mario Beaulieu - it's not a good thing when former 15 year Bloc leader Gilles Duceppe bolts from the convention. Polls would suggest that half of the Bloc voters would vote NDP, and the rest would vote for other parties or stay home... not good news for the Liberals here. A 38-26 NDP-Liberal lead could break down into a repeat of 2011 NDP dominance in the province where they won 58 of 75 seats. Those kinds of numbers suggest them winning ~58 of 78 seats, with the Liberals picking up ~15 seats and the Conservatives and Bloc the remainder (if the Bloc survives at all).

It may perhaps be that the early punditry and polling battle will be who wins out in their home province of Québec: Thomas Mulcair, or Justin Trudeau? Currently, Thomas Mulcair sports much better ratings in this province and the country, but this is liable to change. Who wins decisively out of Québec may translate to stronger numbers in Ontario and the ROC - who wins Ontario will win Canada. In that case, today's baseline may be completely unpredictable as to what happens in 2015. All parties have varying foundations of support, with the NDP's perhaps the weakest and the Conservative's the strongest, with the Liberals the greatest potential. On the other hand, the NDP shows the greatest upside for their leader, with the Conservative's at a permanently low level and Justin Trudeau as pretty split at the moment.

So who will win the Canadian election in 2015? Hard to tell. It took the debates for the NDP to go from 15% to 30%+ in the polls in 2011, and it took a poorly thought of ad for the Progressive Conservatives to collapse in support in 2013. So the real question is, who will win in a debate? Stephen Harper, Thomas Mulcair or Justin Trudeau? I have my answer and suspicions, but I'm no psychoanalyst, so we shall see!