First, here are some graphics of the top five and bottom three responses for each party, with the word size denoting the relative size of people who said these words applied to each party.
So the Conservatives are seen as arrogant (55%), secretive (48%), out of touch (43%), uncaring (37%), and dishonest (33%). Not exactly positive. And they aren't seen as exciting (3%), compassionate (5%), or open (11%). Ouch.
So, the Liberals are seen virtually the same way as the Conservatives, except inefficient (42%) replaces uncaring (37%). They're also arrogant (43%), out of touch (41%), dishonest (38%), and secretive (32%). They aren't seen as exciting (5%), down to earth (9%), or honest (10%).
Compared to the two major parties, the NDP is seen as a less effective party but not a particularly 'mean' party. They're considered out of touch (41%), inefficient (39%), weak (37%), foolish (32%), but also compassionate (30%). The two major parties didn't have a positive aspect in their top five. The NDP aren't seen as strong (7%), exciting (7%), or efficient (8%).
Finally, the Greens. They're seen similarly as the NDP: weak (50%), inefficient (38%), out of touch (38%), down to earth (35%), foolish (29%), and compassionate (29%). They aren't seen as strong (2%), efficient (7%), secretive (8%), or exciting (8%).The main thing you can take from this is that people generally don't have good opinions about any of the parties.
Now, let's look at how they are perceived overall. What I've done is averaged out all the totals for the positive and negative qualities, to give a result of how many people have a negative or positive view of the parties.
So the NDP and the Greens have the best scores, and are seen most positively by Canadians. The Conservatives and Liberals follow, with the Liberals in last - quite surprising, actually. What's interesting is that Angus-Reid also broke down the results by how people voted in 2008. Looking at it that way, Green voters are most enthusiastic about their party by giving them an overall positive score of 47.3%. This is followed by the NDP (40.4%), the Conservatives (32.3%), and Liberals (31.7%).
When it comes to bad qualities, people are more forthcoming. Here there is a bit of reversal, with the Greens edging out the NDP for least negative and the Conservatives taking the title as having the most negative responses. Broken down by party, Liberals see their own party the most negatively (14.0%), followed by the Conservatives (13.1%), the NDP (11.0%), and the Greens (9.3%).So how do supporters see their own parties? For Conservative voters, Stephen Harper's party is intelligent (56%), strong (50%), and efficient (46%). They aren't foolish (4%), weak (7%), or exciting (7%). In fact, they are the only party whose supporters had "exciting" as one of their bottom three responses. An interesting result, however, is that only 9% of Conservative supporters see their party as compassionate. Seen as a weakness by the right, perhaps?
For Liberal voters, their party is intelligent (58%), in touch (37%), and strong (35%). They aren't uncaring (5%), dishonest (7%), or foolish (9%). However, 22% consider the party to be arrogant.
NDP voters see their party as down to earth (57%), compassionate (56%) and in touch (48%). What they aren't is uncaring (3%), secretive (4%), or dishonest (4%). What's interesting is that more NDP voters see the party as weak than strong.
Green voters are most enthusiastic, with 73% saying the party is down to earth, 65% saying they are open, and 64% saying they are intelligent. Greens don't view their party as arrogant (1%), secretive (3%), or uncaring (3%). At 5%, however, they also don't see themselves as strong.
This just confirms what I've seen in these sorts of polls. People don't particularly like the Conservatives, the Liberals, or their leaders. But they respect them. The NDP and Greens always score well when it comes to likability, but not when it comes to competence. I'm not sure what can be taken out of this. Do Canadians want hard, uncaring people to make the tough decisions in Ottawa?
