Projecting a Tory majority

Barry Kay, an associate professor at Wilfred Laurier University in Waterloo, Ont., is an expert on public opinion and elections. He is also part of Global National’s election team. Kay has developed a model for projecting parliamentary seat distributions, from popular vote or opinion polls.

Based on his findings, he says the Conservatives would win a majority government if an election were held today.

You can view his findings below.

Kay spoke to Global News about his projections and the Canadian political landscape.

Question: The Conservatives are close to majority territory, seemingly at the expense of the NDP. Why?

Answer: I tend to challenge the premise of the question. There are different ways to address this issue, pertaining to winning constituencies or gaining popularity with voters. In either case, however, recent Conservative gains are more likely to occur at the expense of the Liberals. That is certainly the case in Ontario, but sometimes less so in the West, especially B.C. When the NDP is competitive in a seat, it is usually the Liberals that are the main competition, again especially in Ontario.

Q: Opposition parties are threatening to bring down the Conservatives and force an election. Would this be a wise strategy?

A: By approaching the two-and-a-half year mark since the last election, this is already one of the longer-lasting minority governments on record.

Opposition parties establish their credibility by opposing government policies, and the Michael Ignatieff Liberals have frequently been criticized for being a "doormat" for Stephen Harper in accepting past budgets.

The NDP has stronger ideological differences with the Conservatives, and has regularly opposed them in the past. They still could switch, but they will be criticized by the Liberals for rolling over to the Conservatives, and acting out of fear and weakness. That argument could cost them votes to the Liberals once an election eventually occurs.

The Bloc's position politically has been fairly solid in Quebec, and they probably have little reason to fear an election.

Ignatieff hasn't impressed overly until now, but he has had two years to change the dynamic, and he probably is thinking that only the dynamic of a campaign will give swing voters the motivation to take a second look at him.

It doesn't always happen as with Dion in 2008, but Harper changed the political dynamic during the 2006 election campaign. Either way, there will be an election by next year.

Q: If an election is called, where will the key battles be fought?

A: The key battleground is clearly in Southern Ontario, more specifically in the bedroom suburbs of Toronto… It isn't simply that Ontario is the biggest province, but rather that it has greater electoral volatility, and more swing seats proportionately than anywhere else in the country.

A secondary example is the greater Vancouver area. If the Conservatives have a shot at a majority, this is where it will occur.

Conversely, if the Liberals are to stage a comeback, they will have to regain the southern Ontario seats they lost in the last two elections, but which had supported them in 2004 and earlier. The voting traditions in the other regions are too solid, for many seats to turn over.

Q: What will the Conservatives need to do strategically to achieve that elusive majority?

A: Stephen Harper isn't loved by most Canadians, but his strategy is to claim solid economic stewardship and question the competence of the Opposition parties. In the process, he seems to have put aside previous doubts about being "scary" on social conservative issues. His negative pre-emptive attacks on Ignatieff are part of the strategy, as is a warning about a Liberal-NDP coalition with separatist support.