Ontario election poll-apalooza is underway.
I suspect the polling industry is going to become an angle of Ontario election coverage soon, as a result of the wildly different pollng pictures released so far.
Earlier this week, I found myself paired in a charity golf tournament with the CEO of one of Canada’s largest multinational polling firms. As we chatted in the golf cart along the way about the Ontario election, he expressed concern over the number of polling outfits that are releasing horse-race results that are inconsistent with or wildly different from others, including his. http://bit.ly/qbgt7P
To make his point, on the day of our golf game, 3 polls revealed different results although 2 of them relatively similar. All three had the Liberals trending, but one poll (Harris-Decima) had them 12 points ahead. A Nanos Research poll had the Liberals 5 points ahead while Ipsos Reid had them just one point ahead. My golf partner told me that given his intimate knowledge of polling science and the research his firm had done, it was impossible that the Liberals were 12 points ahead of the Conservatives when they were still trailing only two weeks ago by almost as much.
Today, we have another poll published by the Toronto Sun, by Abacus Data that claims (among decided voters) the Conservatives are ahead by nine points.
When I reminded him that polling results are published and broadcast by news agencies because they need news, and that “news” is, by its very nature, defined by what is new or the abnormal, he responded by challenging me and the media in general to first ensure the polling firms are reputable, that they have a track record of integrity and that the methodology used is available and transparent before considering their results to be a newsworthy accurate reflection of public opinion – as opposed to an attention-grabbing marketing ploy.