OTTAWA — A majority of Canadians think Prime Minister Justin Trudeau will stay on to lead his party in the next election even as his approval ratings are still extremely low, a new poll suggests.
Questions about Trudeau's future have swirled for more than a year as his Liberal party trails the Conservatives by a substantial margin. Those questions intensified in the last week after the Liberals lost a stronghold to the Conservatives in a byelection in Toronto on June 24.
A Leger poll, conducted online of 1,521 people between June 28 and June 30, found two-thirds of those who responded believe Trudeau will remain as party leader all the way to the next election. Under Canada's fixed-date election law, that has to happen by the fall of 2025.
One out of every three people surveyed said they think Trudeau will step down before the end of this year, with many of those thinking it will happen by Labour Day.
While the results were statistically weighted, it cannot be assigned a margin of error because online polls are not considered truly random samples.
Trudeau, for his part, said Wednesday he has been taking calls from members of his party, but he has said he will lead the Liberals in the next election.
The poll suggests widespread dissatisfaction with Trudeau, with only one in four people surveyed approving of the job Trudeau is doing as prime minister, compared to nearly two in three who said they disapprove of his performance.
Those numbers are almost identical to ones drawn from a November 2023 Leger poll.
The ratings also come after a testy parliamentary sitting where the Liberals fended off constant Conservative accusations the government is out of touch with Canadians and has made everything worse after nine years in power.
Trudeau's disapproval ratings are highest in the Prairies, while Quebec sees the highest level of support for the prime minister.
Love for the prime minister is almost non-existent among those who identified as Conservative voters, with just eight per cent approving of his performance.
Three in four Liberal voters said they approved of Trudeau, compared to 32 per cent of New Democrat voters who said the same.
The poll suggests a large majority — 82 per cent — of both Conservative and NDP voters want Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre and NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh on the ballot in the next election. But only 63 per cent of Liberal voters want Trudeau to stay on.
Poilievre and the Conservatives have seen double-digit leads over Trudeau and the Liberals for more than a year. Another Leger poll published in late June showed a slight narrowing of that lead, but the Conservatives remained 14 points ahead of the Liberals.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 4, 2024.
Alessia Passafiume, The Canadian Press
