Abacus Data on the 2021 Canadian Election

OTTAWA – POLITICS – David Coletto of Abacus Data offers these insights into Election 2021.

1 – The Conservatives lead by 1: CPC 33, LPC 32, NDP 21

Among the 69% of respondents who said they would definitely be voting, the Conservatives have 35% compared with 32% for the Liberals and 20% for the NDP.

2 – We find a three-way race in BC, a statistical tie in ON (between the CPC and LPC) and a tie in Quebec (between the LPC and BQ)

3 – We continue to track two key groups in the electorate: LPC/NDP switchers (18% of the electorate) and LPC/CPC switchers (6% of the electorate).

Since last week, the Liberals continue to have a sizeable lead over the NDP among the LPC/NDP switchers with little change. However, among LPC/CPC switchers, we have seen a noticeable shift in favour of the Conservatives.

4 – Who do Canadians think will win the election?

As of today, 37% expect the Liberals to win (down 6 since last week), followed by 28% who expect the Conservatives to win (up 5), and 9% who expect the NDP to come out on top.

When asked whether the election will be close or will one party win by a lot, 70% think it will be close while 14% think one party will win by a lot. 16% are not sure.

Those who would prefer the LPC to win but think the Conservatives are going to win make up 4% of the electorate – doubling from last week.  Among this group, 43% would vote NDP, 33% Liberal and 12% Conservative. 9% would vote Green and 3% BQ.

My take on the results:

“We continue to see only slight changes in vote intention and impressions on most metrics we track as week three of the campaign comes to a close. The Conservatives and Liberals remain statistically tied although the Conservatives have a slight lead among those most likely to vote. Impressions of the leaders haven’t changed much since last week.

However, we are seeing some important shifts in other perceptions. For example, far more people today believe the Conservatives will win the election. More still think the Liberals will win but the gap has closed substantially over the past three weeks.
The Conservatives are making some gains among Liberal/Conservative switchers, but they haven’t fundamentally altered the electorate. Those open to voting Conservative are stuck at 44%, the same as last week. And so, while the Conservative campaign has been successful in re-engaging its 2019 coalition, I don’t see any evidence yet that it is expanding its audience and building a coalition that can win the election outright.

The Liberal vote share has been stuck in the low 30s now for three straight weeks. Mr. Trudeau’s negatives are rising slowly but importantly for the Liberals, the desire for change has halted its weekly rise in our tracking. Right now, more people still would prefer Mr. Trudeau as prime minister over Mr. O’Toole but that margin has shrunk somewhat from last week.

And finally, while Mr. Singh continues to have the best net impression among the national leaders, the NDP vote is stuck in the low 20s. In fact, it seems to have reversed gains made earlier. There’s still a lot of people who say they are open to voting NDP (48%) but converting them beyond 20-22% seems to be a challenge. The biggest risk for the NDP remains the threat of strategic voting, especially as more and more people come to realize that the Conservatives are able to win the election.

So far, the TVA leaders’ debate doesn’t seem to have fundamentally altered the race in Quebec but we will have more to say on that on Tuesday.”