The Blackout: Ontario Voters Report Card on How Ontarian, Canadian, and U.S. Leaders Performed During the Hydro Crisis; and What Should Be Done

Transcription

1 The Blackout: Ontario Report Card on How Ontarian, Canadian, and U.S. Leaders Performed During the Hydro Crisis; and What Should Be Done Report to Global TV and National Post COMPAS Inc. Public Opinion and Customer Research August 21, 2003

2 Contents Overview... 2 The Players... 2 Performers and Non-Performers Eves Tops, Outperforms Lastman, Bloomberg, and Pataki; McGuinty, Hampton, Chretien, and Bush Do Poorly... 2 Winners and Losers Watch Hampton... 3 Who s to Blame and What to Do... 4 Spread Out the Blame... 4 Tories Blame Americans, Liberals and New Democrats Blame Queen s Park; Consensus on How Much to Blame Ottawa... 5 Who Should Own Hydro Transmission Old Government-Ownership Consensus Dead But Not Replaced... 5 Division about Priority for Employers vs. Consumers Opposition Could Lose on the Issue... 6 Methodology

3 The Blackout: a Report Card Overview COMPAS carried out a n>500 province-wide survey to let Ontarians score the performance of provincial, federal, and U.S. leaders during the blackout, to assign blame, and to spell out what should be done. With a report card score of 64%, Ontario Premier Ernie Eves is the big winner but it is not clear that he can transform his high personal performance during the crisis into reelection. Outgoing Toronto Mayor Mel Lastman, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, and New York Governor George Pataki earn adequate passing grades. Meanwhile, the Ontario opposition leaders join Prime Minister Chretien and President Bush in receiving failing or near-failing grades. are more likely to blame the Ontario government than other hydro actors but they are almost as likely to blame the electricity producer in Ohio, where the problem seemed to start, Ottawa for not protecting the Canadian system, and U.S. regulators for not forestalling the collapse. Former Premier Mike Harris intended privatization is not resonating. Less than a fourth of the province s electorate support the plan with about half of Ontarians wanting full government ownership and control of power transmission. The most that can be said about the Common Sense Revolution s impact is that it removed the consensus favouring government ownership. But the CSR did not build a replacement consensus, and support for government ownership remains strong. As for whether priority flow of power should go to employers or consumers in a crisis, the public is split down the middle. The Players Performers and Non-Performers Eves Tops, Outperforms Lastman, Bloomberg, and Pataki; McGuinty, Hampton, Chretien, and Bush Do Poorly The blackout was a great opportunity for the Premier. As shown in table 1, Eves outperformed every single other relevant actor in the eyes of the Ontario public, earning a grade of 64% on the report cards of the average Ontario voter. No other leader received a grade in the 60 s. 2

4 Opposition leader Dalton McGuinty, Ontario NDP leader Howard Hampton, Prime Minister Jean Chretien, and U.S. President George W. Bush all earned grades of 50% or less. Toronto Mayor Mel Lastman, New York city Mayor Michael Bloomberg, and N.Y. Governor George Pataki all did adequately with scores in the mid- or high 50 s. The multivariate statistical analysis of the data revealed two patterns: In a phenomenon of plague on all your houses, voters who scored one leader badly tended to score all leaders badly; and Leftwing voters tended to stick together with enthusiasts for McGuinty scoring Hampton and Chretien highly; Eves enthusiasts scored Bush highly but not necessarily Pataki or Bloomberg. Table 1: Q3) On a 100 point, school report card-type scale, what score would you give each of the following for his performance during this period ROTATE Mean Liberal Tory NDP Q4.2 - Ontario Premier Ernie Eves Q4.8 Toronto Mayor Mel Lastman Q4.1 - N.Y. City Mayor Michael Bloomberg Q4.7 - N.Y. Governor George Pataki Q4.4 - Ontario Opposition leader Dalton McGuinty Q4.6 - Ontario NDP leader Howard Hampton Q4.3 - Prime Minister Jean Chretien Q4.5 - U.S. President George W. Bush Winners and Losers Watch Hampton While Eves outperformed all others, his performance has not been sufficiently strong or sustained to make much of a difference in party standings, as shown in table 2. The Ontario NDP shows more of a hint of climbing than do the Tories even if Hampton s personal performance during the blackout is not seen as exemplary. Furthermore, Hampton benefits from a degree of enthusiasm among NDP voters that McGuinty does not among Liberals 68% average score for Hampton among New Democrats vs. 57% average score for McGuinty among Liberals. 3

5 Table 2: Combined vote 34% DNK/REF/Won t Vote Excluded May 21/03 Aug 20/03 The Liberals led by Dalton McGuinty The Progressive Conservatives led by Ernie Eves The NDP led by Howard Hampton Unprompted: Green party 2 1 Unprompted: Other 1 1 Eves party may remain in the doldrums. But, if polling in the coming weeks shows a re-emergence of the Tories, the early signs are here: Eves does smashingly among Tory voters average performance score of 77% Eves does at least as well among Liberal voters as the Liberal leader 59% vs. 57% for Dalton McGuinty A sizeable share of the electorate (36%) says that its opinion of Eves has gone up, including 26% among Liberal voters, as shown in table 3. Table 3: Q4) Has your opinion of Ernie Eves [ROTATE POLES] Overall Liberal Undecided Gone up somewhat Gone down somewhat Stayed the same Gone up a lot in the last week Gone down a lot in the last week DNK/REF Who s to Blame and What to Do Spread Out the Blame As shown in table 4, Ontarians do not single out the Ontario government as the sole culprit. This fact goes part way to explaining how Eves could have scored so well on his personal performance. In practice, Ontarians are almost as apt to blame the producer in 4

6 Ohio, where the problem apparently originated, Canadian regulators for not protecting the country, and U.S. regulators for not forestalling the problem in the first place. Table 4: Q5) An important issue in the news. Who do you blame most for the electricity blackout? ROTATE General Pop Liberal Tory NDP Ontario government for not protecting the Ontario system Ohio electricity producer where the problem seemed to begin Federal government for not protecting the Canadian system U.S. regulators for not preventing the situation DNK/REF Tories Blame Americans, Liberals and New Democrats Blame Queen s Park; Consensus on How Much to Blame Ottawa Tory, Liberal, and NDP voters are united in the proportions blaming the Canadian government for the crisis but otherwise differ from each other. Paradoxically, Tory voters are the most prone to blame either the Ohio producer (30% vs. 22% among Liberals, 23% among NDP voters) or U.S. regulators (24% vs. 17% and 12%, respectively). For their part, Liberals (32%) and New Democrats (31%) are especially prone to blame the Ontario provincial government. For Eves, the good news is that only minorities of opposition voters blame the provincial government. In a crisis of this proportion, opposition voters would normally be expected to lay much more blame at the feet of the government, especially a government that they have not held in high esteem for some time. That only a minority of opposition voters blame Queen s Park reveals something of the weaknesses of the Opposition leaders communications campaigns and the strength of Eves personal standing during the crisis. Who Should Own Hydro Transmission Old Government-Ownership Consensus Dead But Not Replaced Two generations ago, the public consensus favoured government ownership and control of hydro, including all transmission functions. Today, the consensus has evolved into a division of opinion with by far the strongest opinion being the old consensus, 5

7 albeit with only half the support of public. As shown in table 5, half the Ontario public favours the old consensus with respect to ownership and control of transmission. Less than a fourth favours the Mike Harris plank of privatization with the remainder favouring some form of devolution, either to non-profit or income trust status. Table 5: Q6) It is sometimes said that electricity is key to the Canadian economy and Ontario s electricity policy is especially important. If you had your choice, which one of the following four options would be your reference for Hydro One, Ontario s transmission utility [ROTATE] [CHECK ONE] Gen- Pop Liberal Tory NDP Remain a crown corporation, that is owned by government Turn it into a non-profit corporation Be privatized and owned by shareholders while regulated by government Become an income trust, a company whose profits are not reinvested but are given completely to its shareholders DNK/Refused In an ironic twist on the Common Sense Revolution, Tory voters are at least as supportive of complete government ownership and control as Liberals 60% vs 52% among Liberals and 58% among New Democrats. Among the non-government options, Liberals and New Democrats are especially favourable to non-profit (22% and 25%, respectively) compared to 11% among Tories. Division about Priority for Employers vs. Consumers Opposition Could Lose on the Issue As shown in table 6, voters are split down the middle about whether industry should get priority access to power during a crisis or consumers. Tory voters are slightly more supportive of priorizing industry than the others but the inter-party differences are moderate. 6

8 Table 6: Q7) There s been some talk about who should get priority access to electricity during a power shortage. Which of the following opinions is closer to your own [ROTATE] Overall Liberals Tories NDP Priority should go to business and industry during a shortage because industry drives the economy and people need to earn a living Individuals should get power during a shortage because the toll on families would be too great to go without DNK/REF Methodology Interviews with a representative sample of N>500 Ontario voters were completed August 19-20, The findings can be considered accurate to within 4.5 percentage points 19 times out of 20. The principal investigator on this study was Dr. Conrad Winn. 7