With two days left before Nova Scotians elect their next government, polls suggest that Progressive Conservative Leader Tim Houston’s decision to call early voting will pay off and that the real battle will be between the Liberals and the NDP for second place.

The Progressive Conservatives are seeking a second consecutive term on Tuesday after ousting the Liberals from power in August 2021. Conservative leader Tim Houston called a snap election on October 27, citing the need for a new mandate and ignoring his election law. government, which for the first time in Nova Scotia has set a fixed election date — July 15, 2025.

In a recent interview, Alex Marland, a political scientist at Acadia University, said the end result is shaping up to be what Houston hoped for when he called the election. Marland said several factors were at play in Houston’s political calculus to act sooner.

“He was leading in the polls and there was a lack of public attention or enthusiasm for an election that was happening against the backdrop of all the attention on the American elections and, of course, there was municipal elections (in Nova Scotia),” said Marlande. “The fact that these were early elections took the other parties by surprise and made it more difficult to organize them.”

The result, he said, was a lack of “interest, anger or motivation” on the part of the electorate. “I think it ultimately benefits the progressive conservatives,” Marland said.

A Narrative Research poll released Wednesday puts conservatives comfortably in the lead with 44 percent support. The NDP was second with 28 percent and the Liberals third with 24 percent. The poll of 800 adult Nova Scotians conducted between November 4 and 17 is considered accurate to within 3.5 percentage points, 95 times out of 100.

Tom Urbaniak of Cape Breton University said the campaign was “perhaps the quietest I’ve seen in Nova Scotia.”

“It’s just less intense on the field,” Urbaniak said. “There are fewer signs and fewer materials coming to the doors, and there seems to be less conversation in the cafes.”

He said the lack of a longer preparation period leading up to the set date also contributed to a general lack of attention, and that the 30-day campaign is the shortest allowed by law. “So that was also a factor.”

Issues such as the cost of living, the lack of affordable housing and the province’s struggling health care system were at the center of the campaign, but no single issue dominated the way the Progressive Conservatives managed to make health care the main issue in 2021.

Marland said what the polls suggest is that the Progressive Conservatives should “move in” to many rural areas outside of Halifax.

“In the Halifax area, they’re in much closer competition with the NDP and that’s a real problem for the Liberals because it suggests they’re not competitive anywhere,” he said. “So the real issue here is how much of the liberal vote will be retained?”

Urbaniak said NDP Leader Claudia Chender has become a strong campaigner with strong debate performances that helped raise her profile in her first election as party leader.

With advance voting numbers indicating possible low voter turnout on Tuesday, Urbaniak believes the battle between the Liberals and NDP will depend on who can attract the most voters in ridings where they are competitive. “This (the result) will favor whoever has strong mobilization on the ground,” he said.

Liberal Leader Zach Churchill agrees. “We need to get people out to vote,” Churchill said, while noting that Elections Nova Scotia did not send voter information cards because of the postal strike. “A lot of people don’t know where they’re voting, so it puts a lot more pressure on candidates, on their volunteers and on the core campaign team to inform people,” he said Friday.

Churchill said he was proud of his party’s campaign. “You only control what you can control. We are putting a lot of effort into developing the right plan for this province and we are running a campaign built around ideas,” he said.

Chender believes his party’s message was conveyed through hard work on the ground.

“We’ve been crisscrossing the province over the last 24 hours and we’re going to continue to visit as many candidates as possible in communities leading up to election day,” she said Friday.

She also believes that voter turnout will be crucial at a time of year when people aren’t necessarily focused on politics. “For us, as New Democrats, it’s one door at a time, giving people the information on where to go and vote,” she said.

Houston, for his part, said he was confident his campaign reached enough Nova Scotians to allow his party to secure a second term in government.

“There is work to be done, but overall I think Nova Scotians recognize the efforts that have been made,” he said Friday. “I’m optimistic, for sure, but we’re going to spend the next few days continuing to work hard and traveling around the province.”

At the time of the dissolution, the Progressive Conservatives held 34 seats of the 55 seats in the Legislative Assembly and the Liberals held 14, while the NDP had six and one independent.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published November 24, 2024.

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