I know it’s federal election time, but we musn’t forget our provincial brethren as well.
Our friends at Angus Reid have released another look at where the premiers remain popular, and where they have somewhat fallen short.
Leading the pack is Francois Legault of Quebec. He sits at 64 per cent approval, which frankly shocks me, given some of his more controversial moves, like his Bill 21: An act respecting the security of the state. Whatever the fancy name of his secularism bill, many see it as distinctly anti-Muslim, but this doesn’t seem to resonate with Quebecers. They appear to love him.
Also loving their premier are Saskatchewanians. Scott Moe of the Saskatchewan Party is at 63 per cent approval. He speaks often of killing the carbon tax, and obviously residents of the flat province agree.
Jason Kenney is at 60 per cent. Now, he hasn’t been on the job long, so is very much still in the honeymoon phase. He enjoys bashing Justin Trudeau, as do many Albertans. The question is, if the Conservatives win the federal election, what will Kenney do? He’s really campaigned, and governed thus far, on hating the federal government. It will be interesting to see what he’s got, if a like-minded party wins the federal election.
B.C.’s John Horgan continues to hold a small majority of voters’ positive opinion. He stands at 54 per cent, which is actually up slightly from the last premier poll. Despite their best efforts, the BC Liberals just don’t seem to be able to gain any ground against Horgan.
Down in New Brunswick, Conservative Premier Blaine Higgs sits at 53 per cent. He also enjoys the pastime of Trudeau-bashing. Same question applies to him as to Kenney. If he doesn’t have Trudeau to kick around any more, what’s he gonna do?
Manitoba is the home of the 48 per cent approval rating for Conservative Premier Brian Pallister. He says he isn’t going to campaign for any political party during the federal campaign, which is an interesting stance.
In Newfoundland, Liberal Premier Dwight Ball’s popularity is on the rise. He’s at 40 per cent now, which is a nice bounce from where he was. In May of 2016, he was 17 per cent.
Next in popularity, or unpopularity, is Doug Ford of Ontario at 37 per cent. I’m actually amazed there are still 37 per cent of Ontario residents who can tolerate him, but his approval has been on a steady decline since December of 2018, when he was at 42 per cent. Ford has also been a factor in the federal election, with Trudeau bringing him up at every opportunity on Ontario campaign stops, and Andrew Scheer trying to remind people that the much disliked Kathleen Wynne was a Liberal, and keeping a healthy distance from Ford.
Bringing up the rear is Liberal Premier Stephen McNeil of Nova Scotia. He’s only at 27 per cent approval. Now this could just be fatigue. He’s been around since 2013, and one does tend to look for something different after that length of time.
Once again Angus has decided that PEI’s population is too small for good polling, and so didn’t include Liberal Premier Wade MacLaughlan in their approval ratings. However, a little snooping around the internet finds that MacLaughlan enjoys a relatively healthy approval rating of 47 per cent. That was in July in a PostMedia poll.
So there you have it. The ratings of all ten provincial premiers who preside over Canada’s ten provinces. What have we learned?
At the beginning of this column I said brethren, because looking at pictures of the ten provincial premiers, one can’t help but note that they are all males of a certain type. Not one female. Not one person of colour.
For all our talk of diversity, we’ve got a long way to go.