Article content continued

Declared leadership candidate Tony Clement was third at 11 per cent, followed by Andrew Scheer (expected to enter the race) and potential candidate Erin O’Toole at nine per cent.

The values issue has helped improve Leitch’s approval ratings to 28 per cent in the latest poll, from just 12 per cent in April, although her disapproval rating has nearly doubled to 23 per cent from 12 per cent.

This race has now been blown wide open

Also, the overall awareness of Leitch among Conservative supporters has increased, with 24 per cent of Tory voters polled now saying they weren’t familiar with her, compared with 34 per cent in April.

The poll showed MacKay leading the pack in favourability ratings, with 52 per cent of Conservative supporters polled approving of him, compared with 17 per cent who disapproved.

“This race has now been blown wide open,” Quito Maggi, president of Mainstreet Research, said in his analysis accompanying the poll.

“It appears that the fortunes of Kellie Leitch have risen from the ashes in her bid to become the next leader of the Conservative party.”

It’s difficult to say exactly how much of the increase in support and name recognition for Leitch can be attributed to her proposed values test, Maggi said, but the data certainly indicate it has had a dramatic impact.

The polling data also show there seems to be notable public support across the political spectrum for some of the values issues that Leitch has been floating on the leadership campaign trail, including on abortion rights and same-sex marriage.