'Good news for Premier Pallister': Polls suggest growing support for provincial PCs

A pair of polls suggest Premier Brian Pallister and the provincial Progressive Conservatives are gaining support in Manitoba.

A Mainstreet Research survey of 870 Manitobans suggests support for the governing Tories among decided and leaning voters has bumped up to 45.6 per cent, an increase of six points since the last Mainstreet survey in January.

The recent poll also suggests support for the Opposition NDP has dropped by 6 percentage points since the January survey, sitting at 30.2 per cent, for a gap between the two parties of just over 15 percentage points.

The Liberal party, lead by Dougald Lamont, had about 13 per cent support, the survey suggests.

"This is good news for Premier Pallister," Quito Maggi, president of Mainstreet Research, said in a newsrelease.

A March-to-April survey by Probe Research Inc., which surveyed2,000 Manitoba adults, suggested the governing party had the endorsement of 44 per cent of decided voters as opposed to decided or leaning provincewide.

The same survey, which was done in partnership with the Winnipeg Free Press, suggested NDP support was at roughly 28 per cent and Liberal support was at 19 per cent.

The survey results come after a significant drop in support for the Progressive Conservatives in 2017. Polling results from December 2017 suggested the party had lost 16 percentage points since December 2016.

"This certainly bodes well for Premier Pallister, as his government shows no signs of midterm blues as his government approaches the midpoint of its mandate," Maggi said in the release.

PC support stronger outsideWinnipeg

Both the Probe and Mainstreet results suggest Progressive Conservative support is weaker and NDP support is stronger within Winnipeg compared to the rest of the province.

The Probe poll suggested the Tories had 33 per cent support in Winnipeg and 59 per cent in the rest of the province, and the NDP had 33 per cent support in Winnipeg and 21 per cent in the rest of the province.

The Mainstreet poll suggested the Tories had 36 per cent support in Winnipeg and 51 per cent in the rest of the province, and the NDP had 30.7 per cent support in Winnipeg and 22 per cent in the rest of the province.

For comparison purposes only, a probability sample of the same size as the Mainstreetpoll would yield amargin of error of 3.32 percentage points and would beaccurate 19 times out of 20. Out of its sample size of 870, the smallest subgroup was participants age 18 to 34, with 100 respondents in that range.

For comparison purposes only, a probability sample of the same size for the Probe poll would yield amargin of error of 2.2 percentage points, witha higher margin within each of the survey's population subgroups.