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This article was published 20/10/2017 (1066 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Opinion

After 18 months of growing pains, squabbles with Ottawa, clandestine vacations in Costa Rica, questionable accounting and controversial changes to health care, it appears Premier Brian Pallister’s Progressive Conservative government has all but erased the lead in support it enjoyed in the 2016 election.

A Free Press-Probe Research poll shows the Pallister government with just 36 per cent of decided or leaning supporters, down from 42 per cent in a June poll. The NDP is in second at 30 per cent (unchanged), while the Manitoba Liberal Party trails closely with 24 per cent support (up four points).

The results stand in stark contrast to the support the Tories achieved in the last election, when 53 per cent of voters chose Pallister to replace the scandal-plagued NDP government of former premier Greg Selinger. Back then, Pallister’s chief opponents were left in ruin: the NDP could elicit the support of only 26 per cent of voters, with the Liberals trailing badly at 14 per cent.

The 17 per cent drop in overall support over such a relatively short period of time is not unprecedented, but it is highly unusual. It should be the source of significant concern when Tories gather in Winnipeg on Nov. 3-4 for their party’s annual general meeting. At that gathering, you can expect many influential Tories will be looking nervously at these poll results and trying to predict their party’s prospects in the 2020 election.

At first blush, it’s not good news.

No party can win government in Manitoba without making inroads in Winnipeg. The Tories triumphed in 2016 largely because they were able to capture 16 of the 31 seats available in the provincial capital.

However, the current poll shows the Tories running third in Winnipeg. The NDP leads in the capital city with 33 per cent support, with the Liberals in second at 30 per cent; the Tories trail at 27 per cent. That is still largely within the margin of error (plus/minus three percentage points), but alarming nonetheless if you’re a Tory.

Not surprisingly, the Tories enjoy the strongest support of all three parties among voters outside Winnipeg (51 per cent), those over 55 years of age (46 per cent), homeowners (42 per cent) and those with less than a high school education (48 per cent).

The poll paints a scenario that’s rather remarkable: in just 18 months, the Pallister government has seen an erosion of support that would normally take many years, and probably multiple terms, to accomplish.

The showings of the opposition parties are, in their own way, similarly remarkable.

The NDP managed to hold firm in its support and retain the lead in Winnipeg, despite domestic assault allegations against newly minted leader Wab Kinew.

Respondents were polled from Sept. 21 to Oct. 10, a week after a former partner publicly accused Kinew of assault. Not losing support in the wake of those allegations will likely be seen as a huge win by Kinew’s team.

If the poll results serve as a source of concern at the Tory meeting in November, they should inject excitement into the Manitoba Liberal Party leadership convention, which takes place today.

On the day following the leadership vote, one of the three candidates in the running — MLAs Jon Gerrard and Cindy Lamoureux, and longtime party organizer Dougald Lamont — will find themselves at the helm of a party with the potential to disrupt Manitoba’s traditional habit of turning to either the Tories or the NDP to form government.

There are many caveats to poll results such as this.

The poor showing by the Progressive Conservatives does not change the fact that they are the best organized, best funded and most stable of the three main parties in Manitoba. In the 2020 election, they will have a clear advantage both in terms of the money they can spend, but also the information they will have about voters in each riding. Those are formidable advantages the NDP or Liberal party will be unlikely to match.

The Tories still have time on their side, although that advantage is becoming smaller and smaller by the day. In 30 months, much of the austerity that Pallister delivered in the early days of his administration, and the profound changes he has unleashed on health care, will be largely completed. If — and it’s a big if — he can show tangible evidence that he has made progress in improving the lives of Manitobans, he might be able to steal back a lot of the support he has lost to this point.

As well, the poll results do not fundamentally change the challenges facing the two opposition parties.

The NDP will continue to struggle to put Kinew’s troubled past behind him, and shed voter dissatisfaction with the Selinger government, which failed profoundly to deliver on both fiscal and program objectives.

The new Liberal leader will have to show that he or she is better able to seize the moment than former leader Rana Bokhari in the 2016 election. Back then, Bokhari had a shot to position her party as a logical option for skeptical Tories and beleaguered New Democrats. She failed miserably to create a credible, competent alternative and had no choice but to leave politics.

Heading into the dog days of winter, the poll reveals that Manitoba’s three political parties will continue to be faced with both challenges and opportunities. For the time being, it appears that politics in this province is a super tight horse race — and that’s not a bad thing in and of itself.

dan.lett@freepress.mb.ca