Jennifer Lash talks about another poll, the cancelled all candidates meetings and more

Roy L Hales/Cortes Currents - With only five days of campaigning left until the election, Liberal candidate Jennifer Lash says the energy on the ground in North Island–Powell River is palpable.

 “We've been door knocking, doing ‘meet and greets’ and town halls and phone banking. I am  hearing just an amazing amount of support. So I'm loving it,” she said. 

“This poll to me reflects  what people are telling us. So I am optimistic that the undecided will come over and join us and that we can send a Liberal to Ottawa.” 

She was referring to the poll that Mainstreet Research released on Monday, April 21, which is one of the reasons I wanted to speak with her. You can access it on the Mainstreet website, but need to pay. I also wanted to ask about last night’s all candidates meeting in Campbell River, which was cancelled at the last minute.

Cortes Currents: So tell me about this poll.

Jennifer Lash: “ We did not commission this poll, that's why it's behind a paywall. If we commissioned it, we would own it and we could share it. What it shows is that while the Conservatives are still in the lead, the Liberals are second and within the Conservative’s margin of error, while the NDP are in third, quite considerably.”

Cortes Currents: Jennifer sent that data, which shows the Conservatives at 35%, the Liberals at 27% and the NDP at 18%. As this is the property of Mainstreet Research, I cannot post the chart but the Liberal campaign staff have drawn up a chart of their own. 

Jennifer Lash:  “The margin of error is plus or minus 4.1%, with a 95% confidence level.” 

Given that they are only 8% apart, this poll indicates that it is possible, though unlikely, that Liberals are actually tied with the Conservatives
In another poll, released on Sunday and commissioned by the David Suzuki Foundation, it was the NDP who came in second and the Liberals trailing considerably behind.  

Jennifer Lash:  “What this tells me is that there's going to be a lot of different polls and projections that say different things. I know there's a lot of angst out there amongst people who particularly are worried about the Conservatives winning and really looking for some direction on how they should cast their vote so that they can unite as much as possible to keep the Conservatives out. But right now there's no data that says exactly what you should do, and I don't think there ever will.”  

“Some people are going to choose to believe some polls and not others, and that's totally fine. People can do that, but I think what it comes right down to is there is no definitive poll that's going to tell people exactly what to do.  People need to vote for either the Prime Minister, the party, or the MP that they want.” 

“What we're hearing is overwhelmingly, people want to have Mark Carney as the Prime Minister,  which means you have to vote Liberal.  I know  that people say that Carney's just going to win no matter what, but that's not necessarily true.”

“If we really want Mark Carney as Prime Minister, people need to vote for the Liberal party. If people want a member of Parliament who is part of Mark Carney's government and can help deliver programs, then people need to vote for the Liberal party and that means voting for me.”

Cortes Currents: I also wanted to ask about the all candidates meeting that was cancelled last night.