Liberal pollster Frank Graves latest EKOS poll has the Conservatives opening up a 12% lead over the Conservatives. Normally this is the kind of headline that would get me excited, but Tory strategists are calling this an anomaly saying that their own polling suggests the race is closer. As pointed out in a memo: “In the past, pollsters, have sometimes reported support for our Party that is unusually high relative to the prevailing data, only to have the anomaly corrected in a subsequent poll, giving the artificial impression of negative momentum”.
It is very rare to see a poll released that strongly favours a political party and then have the party come out and deny that it is accurate. Yet EKOS does have a tendency to produce outliers, and then when the outliers return to real value, the pollster can go on the Soloman Show and say that the Liberals are reducing the Tory lead. I would peg Tory support around the 36% level, but 24.8% seems too low for the Liberals. That number should bottom out at 26%, hover at 28%, then peak in the low 30s. I will believe the poll if other polling firms report similar numbers. Forgive me if I don't trust Frank's call list.
The only reason I would disagree is because Darrell Bricker was quoted as saying he has numbers that are nearly the same, and that EKOS poll isn't an anomoly.
ReplyDeleteLots of negative comments re this poll and a lot of us think it is a trap, to get the PM to force an election. Or his next poll will have us back to the mid 30s saying support is going down.
ReplyDeleteNot too many trust Graves anymore. If these figures are real it shows that Canadians paid attention to the truth ads re iggy. I will wait for Nanos and Ipso to come out.
These figures might just make iggy call off his pit bulls in QP, if they are real.
It also puts Graves in a quandry, if he twisted figures, how does he correct them and still have any integrity.
He was too gleeful on P&P yesterday, what was he hiding, and why would he be so happy the PM was ahead by 12 points. He is a liberal supporter.
Just take the good poll and stop making the story anything other than the Liberals are getting pounded by the conservatives, Sheeeshh!
ReplyDeleteLook closely at the actual numbers. In Sask/Man they only sampled 3 under25 so the greens are at 32.9%, the Liberals 32.9 and Conservatives at 34.2 and the NDP 0. Now, how come with 3 people sampled they aren't all at 33.33%, how come the Conservatives are higher? You know this is distorted, the margin of error is over 50% in that category.
ReplyDeleteAn interesting item is that women are now embracing the Conservatives so I guess that "scary" isn't working anymore!
There is this tweet Iceman
ReplyDelete@stphnmaher: RT @RobertFife: Ipsos pollster Darrell Bricker writes of Ekos poll: ” We’ve got almost the same. No anomaly.” #cndpoli
That's Ipsos and Ekos showing CPC taking a bigger lead, tho Ipsos has not published yet.
Perhaps the lead is not as wide as polled,
but these polls could indicate that the rock solid CPC base has increased a few percentage points.
When the Iffy Liberals campaign on the socialist Dipper policies,
why wouldn't the LPC numbers drop closer to Dipper levels?
Dippers will stick with Jack (more NDP MPs in a coalition govt), but those Libs with center-center right views on economic issues, will flee.
Tax hikes and more social programs...not
Then there are the Rural (gun registry) and Social Conservative Lib MPs (19 against abortion motion).
wilson
Mary, I don't think he's going to force an election based on an Ekos poll. I think they base that on their own polling.
ReplyDeleteI don't think Harper believes this poll any more than "maryt".
ReplyDeleteDMorris