By Tom Parkin
February 26th, 2025
BURLINGTON, ON
Justin Trudeau ran left of the NDP and held his leadership bump. But more conservative Dion and Ignatieff saw their leadership bump melt away.
Mark Carney’s more conservative positioning may make it difficult for the presumptive incoming Liberal leader to hang on to his current popularity bump, an analysis of past Liberal leadership races shows.
Mark Carney
Carney’s campaign has moved away from Trudeau’s perceived left-wing policies in an effort to collapse policy differences with Pierre Poilievre’s Conservatives. Carney has vowed to cut the public service, slay the deficit, reduce capital gains taxes, and axe the consumer carbon tax, all conservative priorities.
By collapsing major policy contrasts with the Conservatives, Liberals hope to move forward onto new terrain they believe will be more advantageous: leader competence and best choice to deal with U.S. President Donald Trump.
Liberal gains coming at expense of Conservatives and NDP
Two polls released today show Liberal support has increased to 38 per cent from the low 20s only a month ago. That gain has come from both the Conservatives and NDP.
Conservative support is down about 10 points from recent levels, standing at 37 per cent according to EKOS Research and 36 per cent in Ipsos’ poll. In early January, Nanos, Abacus and Leger all found the Conservatives at 47 per cent.
Jagmeet Singh’s NDP has dropped about eight points from last fall, when the NDP peaked at 20 or 21 per cent. NDP support has dropped to 12 per cent, according to both Ipsos and EKOS Research.
Trudeau running left of NDP kept leadership bump
In the 30 days after Justin Trudeau’s selection as leader, polls showed his Liberals averaging 37.9 per cent support.
The Trudeau Liberals consistently lead in the polls from Trudeau’s selection in 2013 until spring 2015, taking support from both the NDP and Conservatives. In winter 2015, NDP support had fallen to the low 20s while the Conservatives fell to the low 30s.
But NDP support recovered at Liberal expense after the surprising win in Alberta by Rachel Notley and the three major parties entered the 2015 election at almost identical support levels in the low 30s.
Trudeau’s strategy of outflanking the NDP on the left, and mistakes by the Mulcair campaign that played into the Liberal strategy, resulted in NDP support declining to 19.7 per cent, 2.8 points below the level during Trudeau’s leadership bump. Conservative support increased 2.9 points.
Dion and Ignatieff saw leadership bumps melt away
The leadership bounces for Liberal leaders Dion and Ignatieff was less strong than for Trudeau, reaching 35.5 and 34.3 per cent, respectively, but also took from both major opponents. NDP support averaged 12.9 per cent in the 30 days after the selection of Dion and 15.5 per cent after Ignatieff’s selection. Conservative support eroded to 32.6 per cent in Dion’s leadership bump and 31.5 per cent with Ignatieff.
Both Dion and Ignatieff ran conventional Liberal strategies, mostly focused on courting policy Conservatives while trying to hold NDP voters on strategic voting calls. The conservative shift was quite explicit under Michael Ignatieff. But even Stephane Dion’s Green Shift platform was centred on new tax cuts for business paid for with a new consumer carbon tax, which had no rebate.
That standard conservative orientation resulted in Conservative support recovering several points while NDP support rebounded strongly.
Carney’s conservative tack leaves opening for NDP rebound
As with Dion and Ignatieff, it will be a significant challenge for Carney to hold on to the support recently gained at NDP and Conservative expense. While Carney’s leadership will collapse many policy contrasts with Poilievre, it creates space for the NDP to focus on their policy contrasts with both Poilievre and Carney.
Carney’s views on NDP signature items such as dental care, pharmacare and school lunches have so far have not been covered in the media, but his focus on slaying the deficit suggests they are at risk. For the NDP, flushing out Carney on these contrasts could hasten a polling rebound and is a reasonable path forward for Singh and his caucus.
Baylis is the one who should lead the Liberals. He was not a “yes man or woman “ who constantly praised Trudeau day in & day out to keep a job as a minister or an outsider suddenly stepping forward. Now we have 4 people running for leader 3 of which are all cut from the same cloth. Do you believe anything they say, are they to be believed? Take a page from Liberals of the past – John Chrétien for example saying they’d do away with HST & then keeping it because it was such a cash cow, change carbon tax, hah. Dealing with Trump, none of them have clearly indicated what they’re going to do, although one has said they would use the “charm” approach. Baylis is a new face not a bought person or outsider. We need someone new, not a repeat of the same “old.”
The real question is, are the polls showing a honeymoon or are they showing a bias?
We’ve seen this so many times and most recently with Harris and Trump. The election in the US proved that many of the polls were highly biased and only a couple were legitimate – this was not difficult to identify at the time which helped me win a few nice bets in USD.
So, let’s look at the most recent Leger Poll which shows liberals with 36% support in Alberta and 50% support in BC. The Alberta number is obvious, Liberals I think only have one seat in that province with real dislike for the party in that Province. In BC, a liberal party provincially does not even exsist! This results make little to no sense.
Now on to Quebec, Blanchet 24% while Carney, who’s French is terrible has 40%, whaaat?
So, by my read, some serious questions about these polling numbers from one of the better pollsters.
Other polls are paid for by organizations looking for specific results with no details issues on how those results are obtained.
Seems like many in the media have lost the skill of critical thinking, and have forgotten events of only 4 months ago. But of course, this does not drive the desired narrative.
This is why, and to quote Brian Lilley, “Polls are fickle and campaigns matter”.
Read the attached regarding polls and statistics. (Polls Askew, Justice Denied, Lives in Peril, and the Subtle Truths of Double-Yolk Eggs) (How three breakfasts suggested the fragility of statistics and the fallibility of statisticians.)
https://graboyes.substack.com/p/polls-askew-justice-denied-lives
A Gazette article a while back suggested that Trudeau had tried to be left of the NDP and had ignored the more centrist Liberal voters. Carney’s platform appears to have restored some of this group. Freeland wasn’t strong in the debate and my impression is that Karina Gould did the best job in both French and English but the party faithful may still throw their support behind Carney.
Editor’s note: My bias is evident – but I think what the country needs is fresh blood – someone younger who has done more than show she is up to the job. The media have not given her a fair shake – a majority of the people who comment in the Gazette see her as a Justin sycophant and think Emily Brown could do a better job. And perhaps Brown could do a better job but not with the Poilievre tire she has around her neck.
The results of the Liberals only, if you don’t mind, vote will be interesting. It is a ranked ballot. If Gould does better than Freeland on the first ballot – Carney could be in real trouble.
Is Burlington ready for its MP to serve as the Prime Minister?