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1 Ontario Vote Intention and Leadership Ratings Tories lead by 4 and Have Most Committed Voters McGuinty most likely seen as Calm Under Pressure while Horwath is most likely to be viewed as Friendly Abacus Data Ontario Poll: September 23-25, 2011, n=1,201 online survey from representative panel of Ontarians Twitter.com/abacusdataca

2 Abacus Data: Not your average pollster Abacus Data Inc. is Canada s newest player in the public opinion and marketing research industry. Whether it s telephone or online surveys, focus groups, one-on-one interviews, or secondary data analysis, the team at Abacus Data conducts public opinion, marketing, or stakeholder research that provides strategic insight to our clients. What sets the team at Abacus Data apart is its fresh perspective on politics, business, and consumer behaviour and a commitment to its clients. Abacus Data offers its clients a comprehensive research tool kit that includes: Custom quantitative studies Opinion leader/decision maker consultations The Vertex Panel ( Omnibus surveys Focus groups Informal discussions Intercept studies One-on-one interviews Custom community panel creation and management Secondary data analysis Dr. David Coletto Abacus Data s CEO David has seven years experience listening and interpreting what voters, consumers, and opinion leaders want and expect from government, business, and the non-profit sectors. He has worked with some of Canada s largest corporations and some of its smallest issue and advocacy groups. He received his PhD in Political Science from the University of Calgary where he taught Research Methods to undergraduate students. David is the Pollster for Sun News and a Visiting Fellow at the Arthur Kroeger College of Public Affairs. He is frequently called upon by news media for his unique perspective on public affairs, millennials, corporate citizenship, and political party finance. He co-authored a chapter in the recently released book Money, Politics and Democracy (eds Young and Jansen, UBC Press 2011).

3 Methodology From September 23 to 25, 2011Abacus Data Inc. conducted an online survey among 1,201 randomly selected Canadian adults from an online panel of Ontarians. The margin of error which measures sampling variability is comparable to +/- 2.9%, 19 times out of 20. Results of the survey were statistically weighted by gender, age, region, education, and past federal vote using census data from Statistics Canada and by past vote using Elections Ontario results from the 2007 General Election. Totals may not add up to 100 due to rounding. Two ways of measuring vote intention For Wave 2 of our Ontario research, we asked question from earlier in the campaign on the likelihood of voting for the main political parties as well as the traditional vote intention question. The intention of the likelihood to vote question is to measure the potential movement from one party to another and the choices voters are considering. In this report, the traditional ballot question reports data from decided and leaning voters and is comparable to other vote intention questions released by other polling firms. Page 6 compares the traditional question with the likelihood to vote (new question). What is of most interest on that page is the distribution of no preference voters on the traditional question (which was asked second). The table below reports the unweighted and weighted distribution by region of Ontario Region Unweighted Count (All Respondents) Weighted Count (All respondents) Eastern Ontario Greater Toronto Area (including Simcoe and Hamilton/Niagara) Northern Ontario Southwestern Ontario Metro Toronto Total 1,201 1,191

4 Traditional Ballot Question (Decided Voters, n=966) Q: If the Ontario provincial election were held tomorrow, which one of the following parties would you vote for in your constituency? Green, 6% Another Party, 2% Liberal, 33% NDP, 23% Undecided: 17% Subgroup Analysis PC, 37% Men Women Liberal PC NDP Green Another Party Unweighted counts Eastern GTA Northern SW Toronto Liberal PC NDP Green Another Party Unweighted counts

5 New Question: Party Most Likely to Vote For (All Voters, n=1,191, weighted) Question : Using the scales below, tell us how likely you are to vote for each of the political parties running candidates in your local constituency during the Ontario election. 0 means you will absolutely NOT vote for the party and 10 means you absolutely will vote for the party. No preference, 27% Liberal, 22% Another Party, 1% Green, 4% NDP, 18% PC, 28% Subgroup Analysis Men Women Liberal PC NDP Green Another Party No preference Unweighted counts Eastern GTA Northern SW Toronto Liberal PC NDP Green Another Party No preference Unweighted counts

6 Traditional Ballot Question (Decided Voters Only) Old vs. New Comparing Ballot Question and Most Likely to Vote Party Most Likely to Vote For (10-point scale, new question) Liberal PC NDP Green Other No Pref. Liberal 97% 1% 2% 5% 33% 36% PC 1% 98% 1% - 20% 26% NDP 1% 1% 97% - 20% 21% Green 1% % - 9% Other % 7% The table above compares the results of the traditional ballot question with the new likelihood to vote for a party question. It shows that for the most part those who said they were likely to vote for one party over another in the new question also selected that party on the traditional ballot question. What is noteworthy in the table however is the column No Pref which includes respondents who did not rate their likelihood to vote for one party higher than any other. When pushed to make a choice in the traditional ballot question, a plurality of these respondents said they would vote Liberal (36%) followed by the PCs (26%) and the NDP (21%). This suggests that at this point in the campaign, the Liberals are most likely to gain those voters torn between two or more parties.

7 Absolutely not going to vote for party X Strength of Support for Each Party (All Voters, n=1,191, weighted) Absolutely going to vote for party X Party X Unlikely to vote for party Could be swayed to vote for party Likely voting for party PC (Wave 1) 50% 23% 27% PC (Wave 2) 47% 27% 27% Liberal (Wave 1) 53% 25% 22% Liberal (Wave 2) 52% 26% 23% NDP (Wave 1) 55% 27% 18% NDP (Wave 2) 50% 32% 18% 0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100% Question: Using the scales below, tell us how likely you are to vote for each of the political parties running candidates in your local constituency during the Ontario election. 0 means you will absolutely NOT vote for the party and 10 means you absolutely will vote for the party.

8 Liberal Leader Dalton McGuinty Q: Do you have a favourable or unfavourable impression of the following people? Very favourable, 9% Very unfavourable, 34% Somewhat favourable, 22% Somewhat unfavourable, 15% Neutral, 20% Subgroup Analysis Men Women Liberal PC NDP Undecided Favourable Neutral Unfavourable Unweighted counts Toronto GTA East SW North Favourable Neutral Unfavourable Unweighted

9 PC Leader Tim Hudak Q: Do you have a favourable or unfavourable impression of the following people? Very unfavourable, 22% Very favourable, 10% Somewhat favourable, 24% Somewhat unfavourable, 18% Neutral, 26% Subgroup Analysis Men Women Liberal PC NDP Undecided Favourable Neutral Unfavourable Unweighted counts Toronto GTA East SW North Favourable Neutral Unfavourable Unweighted

10 NDP Leader Andrea Horwath Q: Do you have a favourable or unfavourable impression of the following people? Somewhat unfavourable, 10% Very unfavourable, 8% Very favourable, 11% Somewhat favourable, 29% Neutral, 42% Subgroup Analysis Men Women Liberal PC NDP Undecided Favourable Neutral Unfavourable Unweighted counts Toronto GTA East SW North Favourable Neutral Unfavourable Unweighted

11 Political Party Leader Attributes Question: We are going to list a number of statements that can be used to describe the political leaders in Ontario. Tell us which statement best describes any of the leaders. Attribute Dalton McGuinty Tim Hudak Andrea Horwath None of them Calm under pressure Genuine Down to earth Friendly Intelligent Unpredictable Inexperienced

12 For more information about this study or Abacus Data Inc., please contact: David Coletto, PhD Chief Executive Officer (613) x. 248 Twitter.com/ColettoD To read our analyses and blog, find us online at