MP Pierre Polivre of Ontario remains the frontrunner to be the next Conservative Party leader, but Canadian support as a whole falls short. It lags behind the opposition Jean Charest.
According to a new Leger poll conducted in partnership with the Canadian Research Association, 44% of Conservative voters believe that his Poilievre will be the best leader of the party, his biggest rival. Former Quebec premier Jean Charest has 17% support.
The poll was conducted online from August 5 to August 7 among his 1,500 adult Canadians selected from Leger's delegation. Online voting is not considered a statistically representative sample, so no margin of error can be given. 8% said no one will.
Of the remaining candidates, Ontario MP Leslin Lewis is 6%, Ontario MP Scott Ichison is 2%, and former Ontario politician Roman Beiber is 1%. got the support of
This comes after Brampton Mayor Patrick Brown was kicked out of the contest by the Leadership Organizing Committee last month over allegations he broke party rules and may have violated federal election law. This is the first election held by Léger.
In his Leger poll in June, he had 44% support for Poilievre, 14% support for Charest and 4% support for Brown among the Conservatives. An August poll showed Charest's figure up three points over him, while Poilievre's figure remained unchanged.
Leger's executive vice president, Christian Bourque, said the vote had already taken place and all signs point to his Poilievre victory.
But he said polls also showed Conservative-backed candidates could face a tougher road to victory in the general election.
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Opinion polls show that 22% of Canadians think Charest is the best choice for Conservative leader, while Polivre is supported by 16%.
About one in seven Canadians surveyed said Mr Polivre's victory would make them more likely to vote Conservative in the next election.
However, more than one in four people surveyed said a Polivre victory would make them less likely to vote Conservative, while one in five said they would vote for Charest.
The disparity is most pronounced in the state of Ontario, which has more seats, with 28% of those surveyed less likely to vote Conservative if Poirivre wins.
In Alberta, 24% of those surveyed said they were more likely to vote Conservative if Polivre won, while 18% said they were less likely to vote. If Charest wins, 14% of those polled said he would be more likely to vote Conservative, while 27% said he would be less likely to vote.
Bourque said it would win his 30th of his 34th seat in Alberta, opening up some existential issues for the Conservative Party, which has already won big in Alberta. . In Ontario, the Conservative Party has 37 of her 121 seats and needs to do better to form a government in the most populous province.
Bourque said Poilievre could help the Conservatives win the same seat by a larger margin in Alberta, but would not do much to move the needle in Ontario.
"With Charest's victory, mathematics will never be the same," he said.
The Conservative Party will announce the party leader's election on his September 10th.
This Canadian Press report was first published on August 10, 2022.
