Poll of Sask. voters has Conservatives maintaining strong support, but Liberals gaining ground
CBC
A new poll of Saskatchewan voters shows growing support for federal Liberals in Saskatoon and Regina — enough to make some races competitive — but Conservative support remains high across the province.
"That the Liberals are really neck and neck with the Conservatives in the two big cities is a bit of a surprise," said Éric Grenier, who runs CBC's election poll tracker and writes about elections at TheWrit.ca.
"If it holds until election day, if we see numbers similar to this, it's very possible the map of southern Saskatchewan won't be painted entirely blue."
The poll was commissioned by the Saskatchewan Urban Municipalities Association (SUMA) and conducted by Rubicon Strategy via an online survey of 747 Saskatchewan residents from April 5 to April 10. The data was weighted to reflect the age and gender distribution of the province. The margin of error for a random sample of this size is plus or minus four per cent.
When asked who they would vote for if an election was held today, 38 per cent of people polled said they'd vote for the Conservative Party of Canada, while 25 per cent said they'd vote for the Liberal Party of Canada, according to results of the poll.
Twenty per cent of voters were undecided when polled and 11 per cent of voters said they'd vote for the federal NDP.
But in Saskatoon and Regina, Conservatives support is dropping among decided voters as Liberal support rises, with the parties within five points of each other among the poll's respondents.
In Regina, 42 per cent of decided voters supported the Conservatives, compared to 37 per cent supporting the Liberals. Saskatoon's split was 43 per cent for the Conservatives and 38 per cent for the Liberals.
Liberal Leader Mark Carney and NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh both made campaign stops in Saskatoon on April 9, while Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre has yet to stop in Saskatchewan this election.
The swing in support, and the decline in NDP support, makes the Liberals more competitive in some ridings, but likely not enough to actually flip more than one seat, Grenier said.
"The margin between the Conservatives and the Liberals [in previous polls] was so big that even with this kind of swing, the Liberals aren't necessarily the favourites to win anything other than Regina Wascana," he said.
NDP support is at 11 per cent and 13 per cent in Regina and Saskatoon, respectively.
The poll also asked voters about leader likeability, their top policy issues and Canada's trade war with the U.S.
Rubicon Straregy partner David Herle said the numbers show the Liberals approaching the Conservatives in several Saskatchewan ridings.
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