Conservatives Surge To 43% Support Nationally - Level Not Seen Since Mulroney Government In November Of 1988

Toronto, ON - According to a new Ipsos Reid survey conducted on behalf of CanWest/Global, the current Conservative Party government is enjoying their highest levels of federal vote support in nearly 20 years, since Brian Mulroney's majority in November of 1988.

Currently, 43% of federal voters support the Conservative Party (+5 points since a mid-March Ipsos Reid poll), giving them an impressive 18-point lead over their chief federal rival, the Liberal Party (25%, -3 points). The NDP (15%, -4 points) trail the Liberals, while the Green Party (5%, unchanged) remains much further back.

• In the Province of Quebec, the once mighty Liberals now attract 14% of the federal vote (-6 points). The Liberals are bleeding support to the Conservatives (33%, +6 points) who now only trail the Bloc Quebecois (38%, unchanged) by a narrow 5-point margin.
• In the traditional Liberal stronghold of Ontario, the Conservatives (42%, +5 points) now lead the Liberals (38%, +4 points), while NDP support has plummeted (11%, -11 points).

Among all Canadians, 11% are undecided, refused to say whom they would vote for, or don't know.

Regional Vote Tables...

These are the findings of an Ipsos Reid poll conducted for CanWest News Service/Global News and fielded from May 16-May 18th, 2006. For this survey, a representative randomly selected sample of 1003 adult Canadians was interviewed by telephone. With a sample of this size, the aggregate results are considered accurate to within 1773.1 percentage points, 19 times out of 20, of what they would have been had the entire adult Canadian population been polled. The margin of error will be larger within each sub-grouping of the survey population. These data were weighted to ensure the sample's regional and age/sex composition reflects that of the actual Canadian population according to Census data.

For more information on this news release, please contact:
Darrell Bricker
President
Ipsos Reid Public Affairs
416.324.2900
[email protected]

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