Brian Pallister is relatively new as premier of Manitoba, but he's been ranked the second-most popular provincial leader in Canada by a new poll.

About 53 per cent of Manitobans polled by the Angus Reid Institute say they approve of how Pallister has been running the province since his Progressive Conservatives were elected in April, the non-profit public opinion research organization said in its findings Thursday.

That puts Pallister only behind Saskatchewan Premier Brad Wall, who remains at the top of the list with a 57 per cent approval rating despite a summer of political turbulence in his province.

The poll puts Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne at the bottom of the list, with an approval rating of 20 per cent, due in part to rising hydroelectricity rates stemming from the majority sale of Hydro One.

The poll results were based on an online survey of 4,629 Canadian adults in what the institute says was a randomized and representative sample of Angus Reid Forum panelists from Sept. 5-11.

A probabilistic sample of this size carries a margin of error of plus or minus 2 per cent, 19 times out of 20.