By Aaron Mahoney (@Mahones93 on Twitter)

Latest Lethbridge College poll still shows UCP on track to form government in upcoming provincial election

Mar 6, 2019 | 1:10 PM

LETHBRIDGE, AB – The upcoming provincial election in Alberta is mere weeks away, and a survey conducted by Dr. Faron Ellis and the Citizen Society Research Lab has found that the United Conservative Party still maintains a healthy lead among decided voters.

The current government, the New Democratic Party, led by Rachel Notley currently maintains slightly less than one-quarter of decided Albertans’ vote preferences at 23.2% while the UCP and their leader Jason Kenney have a clear majority of decided Albertans’ voting preferences at 57.8%.

Other parties in the province are seeing some support as well, with the Alberta party sitting at 7% of decided voter support while provincial Liberals are currently receiving 5.1% support.

The Freedom Conservative Party, created by Strathmore-Brooks MLA Derek Fildebrandt last year, is currently supported by 2.8% of decided voters.

Data for the survey was collected by Lethbridge College students in the winter of 2019, when they interviewed 1,055 adult Alberta residents by telephone from Feb. 2 to 5. As far as the confidence of the results is concerned, the weighted sample yields a margin of error ± 3.0 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

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When broken down into regions, the NDP find their greatest support around the Edmonton region at 39.2% and their weakest support in Southern Alberta at just 13%. Despite those numbers, their overall support is similar to where they stood last fall, but up from both 2017 (19.3%) and 2016 (19.7%).

The UCP holds a substantial lead in every region of the province except Edmonton where they still lead with 41% of support, but with the NDP close on their heels. Broken down further, the UCP has majority support in Calgary at 61.8%, Southern Alberta excluding Calgary at 64.2% and Northern Alberta outside the metro-Edmonton region at 64.4%.

A lot can change during a four-week election campaign, as evidenced by the outcome in 2015, but for now, the UCP is on track to replace the NDP with a majority government of their own.

Among the key demographics that political parties covet, the UCP is also leading the NDP based on the results of the survey.

At 54.4%, women are almost as likely as men at 60.6% to cast a vote for the UCP in the upcoming election.

Younger Albertans, one of the keys to the NDP win in 2015, find themselves just as likely to be planning to vote conservative at 60.4% support as other age groups.

Both middle-income Albertans at 60.5% and upper-income Albertans at 60.2% are more likely to support the UCP, compared to lower-income Albertans who came in at 52.6%.

The NDP finds its greatest support levels among university grads (37.5%), seniors (35.5%) and non-religious voters (28.3%).

The full breakdown of the data obtained by Lethbridge College can be found here.