[afransen TO]

It's a cycle... Harper (or his eventual successor) will blow it in Quebec like Mulroney did, and federalist support will swing to another party, likely the Liberals.

Quebeckers are a fickle electorate... they don't stay loyal to a party for long.

 

[Abeja de Almirante]

It's a cycle... Harper (or his eventual successor) will blow it in Quebec like Mulroney did, and federalist support will swing to another party, likely the Liberals.

I agree 100%. That's what makes democracy work so well, the win-lose cycle is critical. Maybe I'm a fickle Quebecer inside, as I voted Liberal when Martin followed Chreiten, and then changed to Conservative under Harper for the last election. If Harper drops the ball on the fiscal imbalance, and continues his plans to apologise to every cultural group, he'll quickly start to look like the Liberals, and if the socons in his party start making noise, it'll be over for Harper.

 

[billonlogan]

Nik on the Numbers....

Although we did see some positive movement for the Tories when they focused on their five priorities – the new focus on foreign policy (code – Middle East) has effectively changed the channel away from domestic issues. Remember - the last election was won by the Harper Tories on a platform of change, cleaning up government and fiscal issues. Apart from the Middle East issue, the political environment in the Fall will likely feature some sort of revisitation of the same sex marriage issue and the Liberal leadership process.

Of note is the fact that since the last quarterly poll the Conservatives are down nine points in Quebec (down from 35% to 26%). The BQ are up five points to 42% and the Liberals are up three points to 22%. The softening of support in Quebec this quarter should be worrisome for the Tories.

As the numbers from our latest national survey came in Wednesday evening, this pollster had a serious case of déjà vu – pretty well exactly the same numbers as the last federal election.

Methodology
Polling between August 18th and August 23rd, 2006 (Random Telephone Survey of Canadians, 18 years of age and older). Percentages may not add up to 100 due to rounding. The change in brackets is from the last SES National Survey completed May 9th, 2006.

Decided Canadian Voters (N=886, MoE ± 3.3%, 19 times out of 20)
Conservatives 36% (-2)
Liberals 30% (+2)
NDP 18% (-1)
Bloc Quebecois 11% (+2)
Green 5% (-1)

Undecided 12% (+4)

The detailed tables with the regional sub-tabs and methodology are posted on our website at: www.sesresearch.com

Feel free to forward this e-mail. Any use of the poll should identify the source as the “SES Research National Survey.â€

Nikita James Nanos, CMRP
President

 

[Antiloop33rpm]

Harper is going to have a tough time ahead in Quebec. Not only has he lost some support over his handling of the recent problems in the Middle East and his environmental position, but the fiscal imbalance issue is at best going to leave him with little to any gains in the province and at worst lose most of the support he has. Add to that a provincial election that is likely to held in November and you have an interesting couple months ahead.

I am eagerly awaiting to see just what Harper and Charest have come up with.

 

[Abeja de Almirante]

Harper is going to have a tough time ahead in Quebec. Not only has he lost some support over his handling of the recent problems in the Middle East and his environmental position, but the fiscal imbalance issue is at best going to leave him with little to any gains in the province and at worst lose most of the support he has.

It's a choice Quebecers will have to make between perpetual opposition status for BQ MPs or a chance at the cabinet table of a CP government. The Liberals have no chance at all in Quebec for this upcoming election (once they have a leader, the following election may be different) so it's a choice between the BQ and CP. As it stands, the CP has formed a thus far untouchable government with little support from Quebec.

 

[unimaginative2]

The Liberals have no chance at all in Quebec for this upcoming election

That's what they said about the Tories in Quebec last election. As they say, a week is a long time in politics, and the Liberals have been written off forever in Quebec many times before. The Liberals will have a leader for the next election, and that will likely be the deciding factor on the party's success in Quebec.

 

[adma]

Well, they have no chance at all in the coming Repentigny byelection, that's for sure.

Or the Tories, for that matter--unless they run Michel Fortier; and even then...

 

[spmarshall]

After being dumped by Belinda, it's nice to see Peter Mackay with a new girlfriend. I'm sure that will help Conservative fortunes in places like Quebec (and now the Van Doos are going to be sent in).

"Peter and Condi, sitting in a tree. Sipping Timmy Ho coffee."