Smith-led UCP in a statistical tie with Notley's NDP
With less than six months until next May's scheduled provincial election, Alberta's two main political parties are polling at equal strength.
That's according to a new poll by Angus Reid Institute, which was conducted from Nov. 28 to Dec. 3 and surveyed 591 Alberta adults. It found 48 per cent of leaning and decided voters plan to cast their ballot for new Premier Danielle Smith's UCP, with 44 per cent intending to vote for Rachel Notley's NDP — a statistical tie.
Those numbers represent a 10-point rise in support for the UCP compared to Angus Reid polling early in the year, a jump that reflects dwindling third-party support. Where the Wildrose Independence Party polled at 11 per cent in March 2022, only one per cent of respondents said they would vote for them now.
“It's very much the journey of reuniting the United Conservative Party, which was very disunited through the end of last year and early this year,” said Shachi Kurl, Angus Reid Institute president.
“There's a march away from right-wing voters or centre voters from Wildrose — in sort of a protest vote — back to the UCP, with the departure of (former premier) Jason Kenney and the arrival of Danielle Smith.”
The neck-and-neck results follow similar data from a Leger poll last week, which showed 47 per cent voter intention for the NDP compared to 44 per cent for the UCP.
While provincewide support for the two parties was similar, voter intentions varied in different parts of Alberta.
In Calgary, the NDP led with 51 per cent support, compared to 40 per cent for the UCP. In Edmonton and northern Alberta, the NDP had 50 per cent vote intent to the UCP'S 43 per cent.
The UCP'S polling dominance came outside of those two regions, with the rest of Alberta doubling up on support for the governing party, with 59 per cent compared to the NDP'S 30 per cent.
CALGARY, UNDECIDED VOTERS PLAY BIG ROLES
The data suggest Calgary will be the major battleground in the general election, said Macewan University political scientist Chaldeans Mensah, with the NDP expected to win big in Edmonton and the UCP slated to dominate rural ridings.
“The NDP seems to be doing very well in Calgary, so it will be very important for the UCP to prevent the building of political momentum by the NDP in Calgary,” Mensah said.
Undecided voters will likely swing the election ahead of next spring's vote, Kurl said, as those who have settled on either party appear entrenched in their support.
That's demonstrated in the differing priorities that each party's supporters identified as top issues in the poll. While both NDP and UCP supporters identify cost of living and inflation as key issues, the similarities between the groups end there. Those planning to vote UCP tag jobs and the economy, energy policy and government spending as top issues facing Alberta, while those who support the NDP cite health care, education and the environment.
“These are two vote bases that see Alberta and Alberta politics through completely different lenses,” Kurl said.
“The chances of Rachel Notley making the case to a committed UCP voter or Danielle Smith making the case to a committed NDP voter (are low) … we don't see a lot of fertile ground for either leader to talk past the divide.”
SMITH'S EARLY POLICY DECISIONS POLLED
The poll also asked respondents to evaluate some early policy decisions made by Smith during her first two months as UCP leader.
More than half of UCP supporters said the $2.4 billion pledged to inflation relief is a good policy and is targeted at the right people, while the same proportion of NDP supporters said it's a bad policy.
Overall, 47 per cent of respondents said Smith's decision to fire the Alberta Health Services board will hurt the province's health-care system, while 35 per cent said it will improve the system. That evaluation is also split along party lines: nine in 10 NDP supporters say that decision will damage Alberta's health system, while three-quarters of planned UCP voters say the opposite.
In previous Angus Reid polling, before Smith's election as UCP leader, 54 per cent said they opposed the controversial Alberta sovereignty act.
But that hasn't resulted in a hit to vote intention for the UCP, said Mensah, who argued the policy has had an energizing effect on Albertans on the right.
“It's serving as a mobilization for the UCP, getting supporters from the Wildrose Independence Party to come on board,” he said. “It's playing very well to the broad base of the party.”
Online surveys cannot be assigned a margin of error because they do not randomly sample the population. If the data were collected through a random sample, the margin of error would be plus or minus four percentage points, 19 times out of 20.