Polls show UCP support disintegrating, NDP majority govt. if Alberta election held today
The latest polling from Mainstreet Research, done in conjunction with the Western Standard, bears bad news for Alberta's incumbent premier. According to the figures collected last week, 41% of Albertans would vote NDP if an election were held today, compared to 26% for the UCP. It should be noted that Notley similarly achieved almost 41% of the vote back in 2015, albeit with a divided conservative opposition - although that's not the case this time.
The Wildrose Independence Party [WIP], previously relegated to the fringe, is now polling around 9%. The centrist Alberta Party is supported by 3 per cent, whereas the Liberals and Greens bear 2% each. 16% of Albertan voters remain undecided - and Kenney would hypothetically need to convince near-all of them to remain in power.
The news is even more worrying for the premier among decided voters. Among them, a whopping 48% are planning to vote NDP, 31% for the UCP, 10% for the Wildrose Independence Party; the remaining 11% goes to the smaller parties.
This dramatic shift in support can be explained by taking a glance at how potential voters have changed their political support since 2019. For example, 18% of voters who supported Kenney back in 2019 are unsure of which party they will support this coming election. 12% of UCP voters (in 2019) are now planning to support the NDP instead. 14% will conversely vote for the WIP this time around. The NDP has also taken support away from the other parties: 38% of people who voted for the Alberta Party in 2019 are now planning to back Rachel Notley. After the Liberal Party's poor showing in 2019, over 50% of former Liberal voters will strategically back the NDP next election.
In a Western Standard exclusive, Mainstreet President Quito Maggi offered his take on the news: “This is horrific news for the governing UCP and for Premier Jason Kenney. It’s absolutely terrible.”
With a meager 26%, the Western Standard also noted that the UCP is "polling lower than the 28 per cent received by the Progressive Conservatives under Jim Prentice in 2015."
However, Maggi has stated that with the 2023 election still years away, it's not all gloom and doom for the Premier just yet.
“There is a way out. A week is an eternity in politics – two years is forever,” he told the Western Standard, noting that "the NDP was hardly on the map before the 2015 election while the Tories were widely expected to sweep."
