Election Writ 3/27: Why the Liberals have moved ahead
Conservative switchers like Carney, NDP switchers hate Trump.
As expected, Donald Trump is driving the narrative in this federal election campaign with the announcement of new tariffs coming to the auto sector. The parties have adjusted their plans accordingly, with Jagmeet Singh heading to Windsor and Mark Carney sticking to Ottawa to chair a cabinet meeting in response.
Polls have suggested that Carney is trusted over Pierre Poilievre to deal with Trump and the tariffs by a significant margin. It means that it’s a good day for the Liberal campaign, even if the tariffs mean it is a bad day for Canada.
The Writ Podcast: Parties plan, the election gods laugh (LISTEN HERE)
While the Liberal campaign hasn’t so far been perfect — Carney’s event in Kitchener was interrupted by a few hecklers last night and he’s had a few missteps, particularly in French — there is no indication that anything is having a negative impact on the Liberals’ standings in the polls.
The Liberals continue to move upward in the Poll Tracker and now stand at just over 40%. That gives them a lead of three points over the Conservatives, who are holding fast at 37%.
Most recent polls suggest the lead the Liberals hold over the Conservatives is greater than three points (Mainstreet Research has it at four points, a newly-released survey by Liaison Strategies has it at seven points, Pollara’s tracking on the Curse of Politics podcast sees a nine-point lead and EKOS Research continues to be bullish on the Liberals with a lead of 15 points), but we did also get a survey from Abacus Data that puts the gap at just a single point. It is worth noting that, now that Abacus is seeing a Liberal lead, the only pollster that still has the Conservatives leading is Nanos Research, which hasn’t yet abandoned its four-week rolling poll.
That means the Conservatives aren’t in a position to win the election — simply put. They weren’t close in the seat count in either 2019 or 2021 despite narrowly winning the popular vote. Narrowly or widely losing the popular vote dooms the Conservatives to the opposition benches.
And likely for four years. If an election were held today, the Liberals would have a 69% chance of winning a majority government. To put that into context, on election day in 2021 the Poll Tracker awarded Justin Trudeau’s Liberals only a 17% chance of winning a majority government.
Going beyond the horserace, there is one finding from the Abacus poll that made my jaw drop.