A third of Canadian’s want the Prime Minister to resign immediately

Campaign Research’s National Omnibus for March had 1,893 eligible Canadian voters participate. Regarding the on-going SNC-Lavalin affair, there was near universal awareness (85%). Baby boomers were much more aware (97%), than were millennials (64%).

Respondents were presented with statements made by both the Prime Minister and the former Attorney General regarding their version of events. Overall, Canadians found Jody Wilson-Raybould to be more convincing with 49% agreeing with her version of events and only 13% agreeing with Justin Trudeau’s version. 16% thought that neither were believable and 22% were not sure. Interestingly, only 37% of Liberal voters believed the Prime Minister, while 15% believed Jody Wilson-Raybould’s version of events. 19% of Liberal voters believed neither and 29% were unsure. 82% of Conservative voters believed Wilson-Raybould’s testimony and virtually none (2%) believing Trudeau’s.

Conservative Party Leader Andrew Scheer had called upon the Prime Minister to resign and respondents were asked if they agreed or disagreed with this sentiment. 35% of Canadians agreed, while 45% disagreed and 20% were unsure. In Alberta, support for his resignation was much higher than the average (59%), while in Quebec, 52% disagreed that the Prime Minister should resign. Among voters that remain undecided on who they will vote for in the coming election, 22% agreed that the Prime Minister should resign, 30% disagreed and half were unsure (48%).

Respondents were then given a choice between an “immediate resignation”, or a “resignation after the election” and “no resignation at all”. 30% of Canadians wanted an immediate resignation, while 16% wanted him to wait until after the election before resigning and 37% preferred that Prime Minister Trudeau did not resign.

Given a choice between Jody Wilson-Raybould, Chrystia Freeland and Justin Trudeau as to “who would be best to lead the Liberal Party”, opinions were divided with Justin Trudeau being chosen by 22% of Canadians, Jody Wilson-Raybould being chosen by 17% and Chrystia Freeland being chosen by 13%. 18% of Canadians chose “none of the above” and nearly half of respondents (47%) were unsure. Of Liberal voters, 65% chose Justin Trudeau as the best person of the 3 to lead the Liberal Party.

“It is clear, that the SNC-Lavalin affair has had a negative impact on the Prime Minister as the issue has become well known across the country and is not just an inside Ottawa issue. Only 37% of Liberal voters say that they believe Prime Minister Trudeau over Jody Wilson-Raybould and that’s a big problem for him and his party. And though 65% of Liberal voters chose Trudeau as the best to lead the Liberal Party, 65% of who remains a Liberal voter is not nearly enough to win an election.”, said Eli Yufest, CEO of Campaign Research Inc.

METHODOLOGY

This online study was conducted by Campaign Research as part of its monthly omnibus study between March 7 to March 10 through an online survey of 1,893 randomly selected Canadian adults who are members of Maru/Blue’s online panel Maru Voice Canada and were provided with various incentives to respond. The panelists were selected to reflect Canada’s age, gender and regional distributions in line with 2016 Statistics Canada census data. For comparison purposes, a probability sample of this size has an estimated margin of error (which measures sampling variability) of +/- 2.3%, 19 times out of 20.

The results have been weighted by education, age, gender, and region (and in Quebec, language) to match the population according to 2016 Census data. Certain areas or groups may be oversampled but have been weighted to reflect their proportion of Canada’s population. This is to ensure the sample is representative of the entire adult population of Canada. Discrepancies in or between totals are due to rounding.

The following screening question was asked in order to determine eligibility for participation in the study

"Are you 18 years of age or older and eligible to vote in federal elections?"

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