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- Bernier’s broad donor base still tops Conservative field<\/strong><\/a><\/li>\n
- O’Leary sells wine on home shopping channel<\/strong><\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
O’Leary was much better known \u2014 just 21 per cent of Canadians had no opinion of him and another 20 per cent were neutral (by a margin of more than two to one, more Canadians had a negative rather than positive impression\u00a0of the businessman and television personality).<\/p>\n
Almost half, or 48 per cent, didn’t have an opinion on Bernier, while 51 per cent were unsure of Leitch, 55 per cent of Raitt and 66 per cent of Scheer.\u00a0<\/p>\n
That the field of 14 leadership contestants is\u00a0largely unknown to Canadians is not new. But the poll suggests\u00a0that Canadians are getting no more familiar with some of the leading contenders as the campaign rolls on.<\/p>\n
Candidate profiles remain low<\/h2>\n
Compared with Abacus’s last poll in December<\/a>, familiarity with O’Leary increased, as more Canadians said they had a negative view of him.<\/p>\n
But Canadians have learned little more about the other candidates\u00a0over the last two months. The\u00a0proportion of Canadians who were neutral or had no opinion of Leitch\u00a0dropped by just five points to a combined 72 per cent. It was unchanged for\u00a0Bernier at 74 per cent\u00a0and actually increased by one point for both\u00a0Raitt\u00a0and\u00a0Scheer to 81 and 90 per cent\u00a0respectively.<\/p>\n
A recent Global News\/Ipsos poll<\/a> suggests that “neutral” opinions might be an indication of\u00a0low familiarity \u2014 for instance, Ipsos found that 50 per cent of respondents had never heard of Bernier, while 24 per cent had only heard his name, almost identical to Abacus’s results for “don’t know” (48 per cent) and “neutral” (26 per cent) for the Quebec MP.<\/p>\n
This pattern held for the other candidates (with the exception of Leitch, who was better known in the Abacus survey).<\/p>\n
![\"Conservative](\"http:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/wp-content\/plugins\/RSSPoster_PRO\/cache\/b676b_conservative-leadership-20170213.jpg\")
<\/p>\nConservative Party leadership candidates pose for a group photo before the Montreal debate: (left to right) Kevin O’Leary, Andrew Saxton, Andrew Sheer, Rick Petterson, Chris Alexander, Michael Chong, Lisa Raitt, Kellie Leitch, Maxime Bernier and Steven Blaney. (Paul Chiasson\/Canadian Press)<\/p>\n
Ipsos also tested respondents’ awareness of\u00a0the candidates not included in Abacus’s survey. The proportion unfamiliar with Chris Alexander, Steven Blaney, Michael Chong, Pierre Lemieux, Deepak Obhrai, Erin O’Toole, Rick Peterson, Andrew Saxton and Brad Trost\u00a0ranged from 86 to 93 per cent.<\/p>\n
As with the Abacus poll, a majority of respondents knew enough about O’Leary to form an opinion of him. But O’Leary’s profile does have its limits: he was unknown to 81 per cent of Quebecers in the Ipsos poll.<\/p>\n
It might also be possible to overstate O’Leary’s social media reach. With over 625,000 Twitter followers, O’Leary’s audience dwarfs those of his rivals, none of whom have more than 25,000 followers. But according to Twitter Canada, just 24 per cent of O’Leary’s followers are Canadians.<\/p>\n
O’Leary better known than were Harper, Mulcair<\/h2>\n
When Stephen Harper was vying for the Conservative Party’s leadership in 2004, an Ipsos poll<\/a> found that 55 per cent of Canadians didn’t know enough about him to form an impression \u2014 despite Harper having then been leader of the Canadian Alliance for nearly two years.<\/p>\n
Still, that score would have put\u00a0Harper ahead of all but O’Leary in today’s leadership race. But O’Leary’s celebrity is still less than Justin Trudeau’s was in 2013.\u00a0An Angus Reid survey<\/a> found just 30 per cent of Canadians were unfamiliar with him when he ran for the Liberal Party leadership that year.<\/p>\n
With the exception of Trudeau, O’Leary is one of the best-known personalities\u00a0to recently contend for a party’s top job \u2014 more people are familiar with him today (58 or 59 per cent in the Abacus and Ipsos polls) than they were with Marc Garneau in the Liberals’ 2013 campaign (42 per cent<\/a>), Tom Mulcair in the NDP’s 2012 race (36\u00a0per cent<\/a>), Belinda\u00a0Stronach in the Conservatives’ 2004 contest (31 per cent<\/a>)\u00a0or Peter MacKay in the Progressive Conservatives’ 2003 vote (30 per cent<\/a>).<\/p>\n
Bernier, others among least known<\/h2>\n
But O’Leary’s opponents are at the other end of the scale. If Bernier prevails, he\u00a0would be one of the least-known winners in recent history. He is about as well known as Paul Dewar and less known than Brian Topp\u00a0were when they failed to take the NDP’s top prize in 2012.<\/p>\n
Raitt and Leitch are about on par with names like Tony Clement in 2004, Peggy Nash in 2012\u00a0and Martin Cauchon in 2013.<\/p>\n
Other leading contenders like O’Toole, Chong or Scheer\u00a0are among the least-known leadership candidates in recent years, ranking alongside Martin Singh in 2012\u00a0and Deborah Coyne in 2013\u00a0\u2014 candidates familiar only to political trivia buffs.<\/p>\n
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- The Pollcast:\u00a0<\/strong>Behind the scenes of the Conservative leadership race<\/strong><\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
So O’Leary’s bid for the Conservative leadership race (a celebrity competing against a field of largely unknown candidates)\u00a0has much in common with Trudeau’s 2013 run. But unlike that campaign, O’Leary is not the prohibitive favourite.<\/p>\n
And that means someone who most Canadians have still never heard of could be the next leader of the Conservative Party.<\/p>\n
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- O’Leary sells wine on home shopping channel<\/strong><\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n