The election campaign in Quebec hit a turning point over the last few days, as three new polls suggest the Parti Québécois is now on the cusp of securing a majority government as support for the governing CAQ sharply drops.
Today’s update to The Writ’s Quebec Election Tracker now puts the PQ in the lead in 68 ridings across the province, just above the 64-seat threshold needed for a majority government. The party’s average seat haul in the model’s 10,000 simulations is 59 seats, just below the majority threshold (and a reflection of the high degree of uncertainty remaining in the riding-by-riding battles). But the result is that the odds of a PQ majority have spiked from just 6% in last Wednesday’s update to 46% today.
The PQ is also now over 30% support in the vote projection for the first time during this campaign. The Liberals are holding second with 22% and 36 seats, but their ceiling tops out at 39 seats due to the party’s continuing inability to breakthrough among francophone voters.
The Conservatives have surged into third place in the vote projection with just over 19% and are projected to win 14 seats, enough to land them third spot in the National Assembly.
That’s because support for the CAQ has cratered. Now at just 16.9% in the vote projection, the party is projected to be leading in only a single seat. The model sees them within striking distance of dozens more, so the average seat projection sits at 11.9 seats. But the floor is really falling out for the CAQ. In 52% of simulations, the CAQ wins seven seats or fewer.
The three polls out today (from Léger for Le Journal de Montréal/Québec and TVA, Synopsis Recherche for La Presse and Pallas Data) all put the PQ at 30%, a mark that has been stubbornly elusive for the party since the outset of the campaign. All three pollsters all put the Liberals in second place (with between 22% and 26%). They also put the CAQ and Conservatives either tied for third place or within two points of one another.
The trendlines from these three pollsters are quite clear. Both Léger and Pallas were last in the field more recently (around Sept. 18-21) and, since then, have recorded a drop of four and three points, respectively, for the CAQ with the PQ (one and two points), Liberals (three and one point) and Conservatives (one point) all benefitting.
Compared with when all three pollsters were last in the field at the same time (around Sept. 10-13, so before the three debates were held) the movement has been even more dramatic.