The Liberals’ decline continues in our newest poll: Justin Trudeau’s party is now below 29 points in voter intentions for the first time in a long time — and the long-term trend for the LPC is not positive. The Conservatives, while down from a high of 35 points, now enjoy a small but statistically significant lead based on the Liberal decline.

The real story here, however, may be a gradual but significant rebound in NDP fortunes. The New Democrats have climbed from below 18 points to just over 23 and they now trail the Liberals by just five points. The NDP has a strengthened lead in Quebec and is showing renewed strength elsewhere in the country. Indeed, voters’ political calculations may change under these circumstances, as the promiscuous progressive segment — which is more interested in defeating Stephen Harper than in electing a specific progressive option — may start looking more carefully at the NDP.

This is a bad poll for the Liberals. It’s also a grim one for Harper and his Conservatives; the party has stalled (and may actually be falling back), while confidence in direction of the federal government is dropping. Support for the anti-Islamic State military mission — to which Mr. Harper has closely tied his political fortunes — is, as we told you Thursday, beginning to fade. Support for extending the mission is dropping fast and Mr. Harper risks finding himself on the wrong side of this issue very soon. This, combined with the continued poor performance of the national economy, presents clear areas of opportunity for both the Liberals and the NDP (as well as the Green Party and Bloc Québécois).

The longer-term decline for the Liberals is in part a product of the recent prominence of terrorism and the security file. The results also seem to suggest that the Liberals’ numbers are suffering from a lack of clarity in the party plans for the country and its citizens. The New Democrats, in contrast, may owe their improved polling performance to staking out clear stances on issues such as Bill C-51 and the Islamic State mission. The key challenge for opposition parties will be to turn the channel from the Middle East to the middle class.

Frank Graves is founder and president of EKOS Polling.

Methodology:

This study was conducted using High Definition Interactive Voice Response (HD-IVR™) technology, which allows respondents to enter their preferences by punching the keypad on their phone, rather than telling them to an operator. In an effort to reduce the coverage bias of landline only RDD, we created a dual landline/cell phone RDD sampling frame for this research. As a result, we are able to reach those with a landline and cell phone, as well as cell phone only households and landline only households.

The field dates for this survey are March 18-24, 2015. In total, a random sample of 4,311 Canadian adults aged 18 and over responded to the survey. The margin of error associated with the total sample is +/-1.5 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

Please note that the margin of error increases when the results are sub-divided (i.e., error margins for sub-groups such as region, sex, age, education). All the data have been statistically weighted by age, gender, region, and educational attainment to ensure the sample’s composition reflects that of the actual population of Canada according to Census data.