Time goes on, and now we can average out the polls from May. Five national polls were taken during this month, totalling 15,928 interviews. A further three polls were taken in Quebec alone. Here are the results we get at the national level, with the difference from last month's average in brackets.Liberals - 33.7% (-0.9)
Conservatives - 31.5% (-0.2)
New Democrats - 15.4% (+0.5)
Greens - 9.5% (+1.3)
Bloc Quebecois - 8.9% (-0.5)
The big winners this month are the New Democrats and Greens. The Liberals and the Bloc are the losers of May. The seat projection for these results is as follows, with the difference from last month in brackets:
Liberals - 121 (-11)
Conservatives - 115 (+6)
Bloc Quebecois - 49 (unchanged)
New Democrats - 22 (+4)
Greens - 1 (+1)
So we end up with a razor thin Liberal minority. The Conservatives and New Democrats were the beneficiaries of the Liberal slip. While in April the Tories and NDP couldn't combine to defeat the projected Liberal government, they can now manage it easily.
The regional results, with difference from last month in brackets:
BRITISH COLUMBIA (four polls)
Conservatives - 36.8% (+2.3)
Liberals - 27.6% (-2.6)
New Democrats - 23.5% (-0.5)
Greens - 10.5% (-0.1)
ALBERTA (four polls)
Conservatives - 54.4% (-4.5)
Liberals - 20.7% (-0.1)
Greens - 13.3% (+2.6)
New Democrats - 10.3% (+2.1)
PRAIRIES (four polls)
Conservatives - 45.7% (+0.8)
New Democrats - 22.4% (+2.3)
Liberals - 21.1% (-6.7)
Greens - 9.7% (+3.8)
ONTARIO (five polls)
Liberals - 40.3% (-3.1)
Conservatives - 35.1% (+0.7)
New Democrats - 14.2% (+0.1)
Greens - 9.3% (-0.3)
QUEBEC (eight polls)
Bloc Quebecois - 36.6% (-0.9)
Liberals - 34.3% (+1.0)
Conservatives - 12.4% (-0.2)
New Democrats - 10.8% (+0.8)
Greens - 5.9% (+0.3)
ATLANTIC CANADA (four polls)
Liberals - 35.5% (-7.0)
Conservatives - 29.6% (+0.9)
New Democrats - 24.3% (+0.8)
Greens - 9.4% (+4.4)
The New Democrats gained points in five of the six regions, with the 2.3 point bump in the Prairies the largest. The Conservatives gained in four of the six regions, British Columbia first among them. The loss of 4.5 percentage points in Alberta, however, is significant. It makes Liberals and New Democrats electable in the province. The Greens also gained in four regions, the 4.4 point increase in Atlantic Canada giving them a seat (Elizabeth May, assuming she runs in Central Nova again). The Liberals, however, lost in five of the six regions, a big reversal of recent trends. And while they only dipped 2.6 points in British Columbia and 0.1 points in Alberta, they lost almost 7 points each in the Prairies and Atlantic Canada. Their 3.1 point loss in Ontario isn't huge, but in such a battleground province it can mean a significant number of seats. This leads one to ask whether the attack ads actually have been working after all.
