Thursday, February 4, 2010 10:40 AM
Seat projections raise spectre
of Liberal-NDP coalition
A Liberal-NDP coalition government is beginning to look like a possibility, given new seat projections from EKOS pollster Frank Graves.
In his latest model, the Liberals would win 122 seats while the New Democrats would take 31. Together, the two parties would have 153 seats – just shy of a majority government in the 308-seat House of Commons.
The Conservatives, meanwhile, would win only 109 seats compared to the 145 seats they have now. The Liberals currently have 77 seats.
As well, Mr. Graves’s projections – based on the results of his poll of 3,406 Canadians surveyed between Jan. 27 and Feb. 2 – gives the Bloc 45 seats, the Greens come up empty and there is one “other” seat, that could be won by an independent in Quebec.
The idea of a coalition fits with recent Tory spin. Indeed, Conservative strategists and officials have been talking about a new coalition forming between the Liberals and NDP as Michael Ignatieff and Jack Layton plot a strategy to limit Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s power to prorogue.
Canadians reacted violently to the idea of a coalition government in late 2008. That coalition would have seen the Liberals leading with the NDP being given several positions in the cabinet. Mr. Harper prorogued Parliament then to avoid a confidence vote, and the idea of a coalition died with the shutdown.
However, Mr. Graves says Canadians at the time were not as opposed to a Liberal/NDP government as they were to then-Liberal leader Stéphane Dion leading it. Canadians had voted decidedly against Mr. Dion in the general election of Oct. 2008; they didn’t want to see him as prime minister two months later.
“I think there was a fundamental misread of the coalition,” Mr. Graves told The Globe today. “It was absolute outrage at the idea that we just had this crappy election that decided nothing other than we don’t want Mr. Dion around as our prime minister.”
When it became possible that Mr. Dion could take office, the public reacted with outrage, seeing a bit of “chicanery and manipulation” that was viewed as anti-democratic. But Mr. Graves says when he went back to poll again in January of 2009, when Mr. Dion was out as the Liberal leader, he found the public wasn’t that averse to a coalition government.
Meanwhile, his latest poll has the Liberals and Conservatives in a virtual tie for the third consecutive week. And he believes election buzz will start to increase as the Liberal numbers appear to be solid instead of a temporary aberration.
He says the Liberals have been rising – albeit at a “glacial pace” – as the public becomes more comfortable with leader Michael Ignatieff. But don’t get carried away, he says, as there is no “Iggy-mania” – just a little bit of evidence Canadians are now giving the Liberal Leader a second look.
As for Mr. Harper, Mr. Graves characterizes him as the “Swiss Army knife of government” who does everything. The problem with being so in control, though, is that the Conservatives then fail or win “on his fortunes.” And he says these last few months have had a “direct and corrosive impact on his reputation.”
(Editorial cartoonby Brian Gable/The Globe and Mail)
