Is Brown leading the pack?
Patrick Brown campaign claims its internal polling shows he’s gaining support in the PC leadership race
Is it possible that Patrick Brown, who resigned as Ontario Progressive Conservative leader, then joined the race for his old job three weeks later, could now be winning that strange contest?
Internal polling from Brown’s campaign obtained by the National Post late Saturday suggests he moved from second to first among the five candidates for the leadership last week, though with well under the 50 per cent needed to clinch victory on the first ballot.
The number of undecided voters also remained high. And there are still five days of campaigning left until the online vote starts, with the second of two debates to come next Wednesday.
As well, when the three days of poll results are combined, it shows a tight race among decided voters at the top between Brown and former provincial politician Christine Elliott.
Businessman Doug Ford trails in third place, lawyer Caroline Mulroney is well behind him, and parents’ advocate Tanya Granic Allen lies in fifth, according to the survey.
Still, if the internal polling numbers are accurate, they point to a remarkable political comeback for Brown, who is no longer even a member of the opposition Conservative caucus in Ontario.
The member of provincial parliament from Barrie, Ont., quit as leader Jan. 24 after CTV News reported that two women had accused him of sexual misconduct while he was a federal MP 10 years ago. He later was thrown out of the Tory caucus and removed as its candidate in his riding.
Brown has called the misconduct charges false and malicious, is suing CTV for libel and, just two hours before the deadline for entering the leadership a week ago, shocked the party by flinging his hat in the ring.
The Mainstreet Research poll contacted between 4,412 and 6,096 paid-up members of the party each day from Feb. 20 to 22. The survey’s margin of error was not immediately available, meaning the figures should be read with
caution.
When the three days are totaled, Brown and Elliott are deadlocked at about 28 per cent of decided voters, followed by Ford at 22 per cent, Mulroney at just over 14 per cent and Granic Allen at less than seven per cent. Undecideds represented 18 per cent of all respondents.
But Brown campaign organizers are touting changes each day over the three days as evidence their candidate has momentum.
His total grew steadily from 840 members on Feb. 20 to 1,420 on Feb. 22, while Elliott garnered 1,399 and 1,521 in the first two days, before slipping to 700.
However, province-wide popular vote totals may not equal success in the election. In a bid to ensure the winner has broad support, the party is assigning each riding 100 electoral votes, divided proportionately according to the total each candidate gets in that district. So a wide margin in a few ridings —Brown, for instance, is believed to have a strong lead among south-Asian Canadians in some constituencies around Toronto — would not necessarily produce victory.
When asked who they would support on the second ballot — which will be held if no one captures over half the votes on the first — between 24 and 25 per cent of decided voters chose Elliott, Brown or Ford, 19 per cent Mulroney and 7.5 per cent Granic Allen.
Balloting is scheduled to take place from March 2 to 8 in the one-member/one-vote election, with the results announced on March 10. The winner will lead the Conservatives into Ontario’s June 7 election, with polls now showing them well ahead of the governing Liberals.