Say what you want, but I seem to be causing shifts. A couple of weeks ago, I wrote that the Bloc was likely to disappear. Just after that, the Bloc was rising again. Then, earlier this week, I did an analysis showing that the Liberals of Justin Trudeau needed to have a significant lead in Ontario in order to really challenge Harper. I was also showing that at this point, this lead wasn't there (something that was confirmed by riding polls) The very same day, we started seeing polls with the Liberal either first or close. In particular, these new polls all show a lead for the Liberals in Ontario. There was Nanos first (+9 pts at some point, although it has slightly decreased to +7 this morning after some fluctuations), Abacus (+7), Forum (+3) and even Ekos now has the Liberals first overall and in Ontario (+7; although the one Ekos added to the poll average is from 2 days ago). There was also a new Leger (+3). And this morning, guess what, we have a new Mainstreet poll. Yes, the same guys who showed the Conservatives almost in majority territory a couple of days ago (by publishing a poll days after having collected the data). And the new poll now shows Conservatives and Liberals neck and neck overall, with the Liberals a full 7 points ahead in Ontario. So either they were wrong back then, or really the Liberals have had a good week (I suspect it's a mix of both).

So, Liberal supporters, you should maybe be worried of what I'm about to write because I could cause it to change: the Liberals are definitely on the rise. They are getting close to really challenging the Conservatives. (note: just in case, I'm joking here, I know I don't cause anything except maybe some anger to some people on Twitter)

The new projections are below. The Liberals are still second. I added the Nanos of this morning, as I do every 3 days. I'll add Ekos later when published as well.

See the details on the permanent page for the federal election.

Why are the Liberals still not higher? Well, first of all, the electoral system being what it is, the nationwide numbers are meaningless. You need to look at provincial ones. And there, you see the Liberals killing it in Atlantic, involved in a potential 4-way race in Quebec where they can't expect that many seats from, on the rise in Ontario where it's starting to pay off, up in Manitoba but still third in Saskatchewan (as confirmed by another Mainstreet poll this morning; Those guys are busy), still too far in Alberta to really expect more than 1-2 seats and finally, and this could become significant next week, potentially challenging for first in BC. But as of right now, I still see them slightly lagging in terms of seats.

Also, remember that I try to account for the systematic underestimation of incumbents by the polls. Therefore, if polls show CPC and LPC tied overall, my projections will give the Tories a small edge. Yes this is partially subjective and yes I'll live and die on it. At the same time, taking polls purely at face value is not necessarily better. Polls allocate undecided weirdly and again, have a strong tendency to underestimate incumbents (as well as the Conservatives in 2008 and especially in 2011). But you can hate me for these small adjustments. You should know however that I slightly changed them. I used to allocate 50% of undecided to the CPC and 25% to the NDP and Liberals each. I now give more to the Liberals and less to the NDP to reflect the fact the NDP is falling and dropping to third. You should also know that even without my adjustments, I'd still predict the Tories to be favourites. Just slightly less.

At the end of the day, if you hate my adjustments, just use the model yourself with your numbers.

The NDP is literally collapsing. In Quebec, it seems this party is now in danger of not finishing first. Although, to be fair, Quebec seems pretty unpredictable with polls showing the NDP ahead, others the Liberals and some even have the Tories. The only good news for Thomas Mulcair is that the Bloc seems to have fallen back below 20%. In Ontario, the NDP is now clearly under its result of 2011 and is polled as low as 14% in the new Mainstreet! There are 10 days left to this campaign and I'm not sure there is anything Mulcair can do to bounce back. At this point, they probably need to focus on Quebec and BC to save some seats. And maybe expect that some of the industrial Ontario will react to the TPP.

I'm not in the business of predicting what will happen in 10 days. But let's just say the last week should be interesting. If the numbers keep being good for the Liberals, I might have final projections that would be, literally, too close to call (finally! After covering so many elections with final predictions so clear - Alberta 2015, Quebec 2014, Ontario 2014).

We are getting an unprecedented number of riding polls. Forum is releasing some every few days, Environics is polling a couple of ridings multiple times and Mainstreet is also providing its fair share of data, including four new polls in the Ottawa region this morning. You also have some from insight West and Sigma. Even better, some ridings have been polled by more than one firm. For instance, Ottawa West Nepean has been polled by Environics, Forum and Mainstreet, with relatively similar results.

Riding polls are, by nature, less accurate than national polls. Mostly because of the usual small sample size (less than 400 for most Forum polls). Although Mainstreet and Environics are both polling as many as 800-900 respondents at times. Still, by experience, riding polls can be very wrong (hey, remember Brandon-Souris?). Not sure why. One reason could be that it's hard to make sure you are polling people really in one riding. After all, phone numbers are all mixed up.

Nevertheless, with such a high number of polls, in particular in Ontario, we can get a relatively good idea of the dynamics of this election by looking at these polls. We can also see if the projections are off. After all, some people trust riding polls more than my "made up" numbers!

Let's look at the very recent polls. I'm talking of the one published in the last 2 weeks. You also have my projections using the national and provincial polls at the times (click on it for a version that almost doesn't look terrible).

The results? Well first of all, notice how close I am with my projections in average. I know some of you could think that this is expected, but it remains very satisfying. In average, my projections are around 4 points in absolute deviation. This is a level of accuracy that I'd be proud of on Oct. 19. In terms of seats projected, I have literally the same count, although two mistakes cancel out. And since I'm sometimes above and sometimes below, it averages out.

Of course, these riding polls could be way off (and some of them likely are given the sample sizes), but you'd expect the average to at least work out.

What is true also is that the Green Party seems quite high on Vancouver Island (other, older riding polls have shown the same). I'll have to make adjustments. It might not give the Greens any additional seat, but it'll increase their chances in some ridings.

Also, what we see is that my projections do not underestimate the Liberals, neither in votes nor seats. If anything, my projections seem to slightly underestimate the Conservative vote in Ontario. So again, I understand other polls aggregators/projections show the Liberals much higher (some, like the Signal of the Toronto Star, even have the Liberals leading!!), but the numbers here should convince you that they are wrong. I'm not saying the Liberals aren't increasing or that they won't be higher in 2 weeks, I'm simply saying that as of right now, the Conservatives would win the most seats. And as i was showing yesterday in the Huffington Post, the only chance for Justin Trudeau to become prime minister on Oct. 19 is to lead in Ontario by a good 8-10 points. These riding polls show us that this is more likely not the case currently. Which isn't surprising as the poll average also doesn't show that (although some recent polls have given the Liberals comfortable leads, like Abacus yesterday).

Now let's look at the Liberals gains since the start of this election. I averaged the poll numbers by months, here are the results:

Average August	29.3	30.1	33.8	6.8
Average September	33.7	31.7	26.4	5.7
Average October	32.1	37.8	23.2	6.2

Of course, one issue is that different ridings were polled. For instance, we haven't had an October riding poll in Alberta yet. So I also averaged only in ridings that were polled in September and October (by the same firm or not). Here are the results.

sept	33.5	37.2	22.8	6.4
oct	33.0	40.6	19.6	6.9

What we see is consistent with what the national polls are indicating. The Conservatives are mostly stable since September while the Liberals are rising and the NDP is falling. However, remember that the projections do already account for the Liberals' good fortune in recent weeks. So again, these riding polls show no reason to believe I'm underestimating the Liberals. I understand it might be frustrating for some to see the Liberals increasing and somehow still being stuck at less than a 1% chance of finish with more seats than the Conservatives. But I really have nothing against this party, I don,t have an agenda. It's just that my model and simulations show the Tories as favourite. This post should at least convince you that I don't have a systematic bias.

Le Québec nous a habitué a d'importantes variations (ou même vagues) durant les campagnes. L'ADQ en 2007, les Conservateurs en 2006, le NPD en 2011, la CAQ qui tombe à 10% et remonte à 24% au Québec l'année passée. Cette année, il y a eu la montée et chute du NPD de Thomas Mulcair. Cependant, je doute que beaucoup auraient parié sur les Conservateurs de Stephen Harper pour être en tête des intentions de vote à moins de 2 semaines du scrutin.

Pourtant, selon le nouveau sondage Ekos d'hier - Ekos qui commence maintenant son "tracking" quotidien - c'est exactement ce qui es en train d'arriver. Les Conservateurs sont à égalité avec le NPD à 27.8%! Devant les Libéraux à 21.5% et le Bloc à 17.4%.

Après, je sais ce que certains diront: bullsh*t (en bon français). Mais est-ce vraiment absurde ou irréalistique? Regardons cela.

Les Conservateurs étaient à 23% dans le plus récent Ipsos et à 24% dans le Forum (qui commence à dater cependant). Chez Nanos, c'était 17.1% hier. 21% selon Mainstreet et 19% selon Innovative. Donc oui, 27.8% est au-dessus et le plus haut pour les Conservateurs durant cette campagne. Sans Ekos, la moyenne est plutôt de 20-21%.

Mais voilà, les échantillons régionaux sont parfois si petits que les marges d'erreurs sont grandes. Spécifiquement, ce sondage Ekos a 296 observations au Québec (un nombre déjà supérieur à d'autres). Cela veut dire des marges d'erreur de 4.6% 19 fois sur 20. Donc Ekos est au-delà de ces marges (avec une moyenne à 21%).

En partant du principe que les Conservateurs sont vraiment à 21% dans la population, il y a une probabilité de moins de 1% d'obtenir un échantillon  de 296 observations avec les Conservateurs au-dessus de 27%. Donc soit Ekos est très malchanceux, soit il y a quelque chose d'autre.

Le graphique ci-dessous vous montre les intentions de vote pour les Conservateurs au Québec. J'ai séparé en deux séries: Ekos/Forum et les autres. Pourquoi? Car Ekos et Forum sont les deux firmes les plus favorables aux Conservateurs au Québec.

Il est évident que Ekos et Forum diffèrent des autres firmes. Remarquez que ce sont deux sondeurs qui utilisent la méthode d'appels automatisés IVR. Ce ne sont pas les seuls (Mainstreet a la même chose) mais la plupart des autres font des sondages en ligne. Est-ce la raison qui explique la différence? Peut-être. Lors de l'élection Ontarienne l'année passée, Forum et Ekos avaient pourtant les Conservateurs plus bas que les autres firmes.

Donc le PCC à 28%? Cela semble élevé en effet. Ce n'est pas absurde au point que ce soit impossible, mais il y a probablement une surestimation. Remarquez cependant que le PCC est en hausse chez tous les sondeurs. Est-ce le Niqab? Peut-être. Quoiqu'il en soit, les Conservateurs pourraient bien faire des gains au Québec le 19 octobre.

En effet, en se basant uniquement sur ce sondage Ekos, les Conservateurs pourraient remporter 21 sièges. Le PLC est à 14, NPD à 42 et Bloc à 1. Les simulations donnent même un intervalle de confiance de 15 à 29 sièges pour le parti de Stephen Harper.

Voici la liste des 21 comtés qui pourraient être Conservateurs si Ekos a raison:

Abitibi--Baie-James--Nunavik--Eeyou

Beauce

Beauport-Côte-de-Beaupré-Île d'Orléans-Charlevoix

Beauport--Limoilou

Bellechasse--Les Etchemins--Lévis

Charlesbourg--Haute-Saint-Charles

Chicoutimi--Le Fjord

Gaspésie--Les Îles-de-la-Madeleine

Jonquière

Lac-Saint-Jean

Lévis--Lotbinière

Louis-Hébert

Louis-Saint-Laurent

Mégantic--L'Érable

Montmagny--L'Islet--Kamouraska--Rivière-du-Loup

Mount Royal

Pontiac

Portneuf--Jacques-Cartier

Québec

Richmond--Arthabaska

Saint-Maurice--Champlain

Oui, cela inclut même un comté à Montréal (Mont Royal, de très peu).

Bien sûr, tel que mentionné ci-dessus, ce sondage Ekos surestime probablement les Conservateurs. Voyez cela comme un "best case scenario". Cependant, même en utilisant la moyenne des sondages, les plus récentes projections ont ce parti à 12 sièges au Québec. Pour rappel, Stephen Harper n'avait fait élire que 5 députés dans cette province en 2011. Ainsi, le Québec pourrait être la seule province où les Conservateurs pourraient faire des gains nets. Pour une province soit-disant très anti-Harper, cela serait un peu surprenant.

The fact that Nanos is the only firm providing daily updates is annoying. It means they effectively dictate a lot of the coverage about the horse race in this campaign. And this is a little bit absurd because Nanos only polls 400 respondents every day. So really, there is no point in comparing Nanos' numbers of yesterday and today. I have nothing against Nanos - I consider them as one of the best polling firms in this country and regret they don't poll more often. But it can create a false narrative. [Note: I didn't mean to imply that Nanos only has 400 observations. They do a rolling average. What I meant is that every day, they remove 400 and add 400. So it's pretty pointless to compare Nanos' numbers on a daily basis. You need to wait every three days before it makes sense. Unfortunately, that's not what a lot of people do and they'll compare the Liberals in Ontario yesterday and today for instance]

Why am I talking about this? Because Nanos has shown an important (and increasing) lead nationally for the Liberals for a few days. Therefore a lot of people believe that this is the current trend. A lot of people are discarding the polls showing a big CPC lead (namely Angus-Reid, Forum and Ekos) because they are slightly older.

This is correct if there was really a quick shift in voting intentions. But Ipsos yesterday and Mainstreet this morning show that it's most likely not the case. Ipsos actually shows the CPC slightly increasing, albeit not significantly. Mainstreet's numbers are more shocking. The Conservatives are ahead with 37% of the votes among leaning and decided voters. Liberals are at 29% while the NDP is now far behind at 24%. [Note: some have rightly pointed out that the Mainstreet poll was conducted on Sept. 30 and Oct. 1. They thus waited a very long time to publish it. When I ask the CEO on Twitter why they did this, he said that was the schedule... So technically, if the Liberals are really up in the last few days, it's possible Nanos is actually the only one right]

Not only do the Tories have the lead, they would be 10 points ahead in Ontario! This means that a majority couldn't be excluded. Specifically, using this poll only, I'd get 153 CPC, 87 Liberals and 96 NDP. The probability of a Tory majority would be 6.6%. Yes, that's right, we have a poll showing a chance for a majority. It's only one poll, but still. And while some polls can sometimes look like outliers, it's still nice that they are published. At least we can avoid surprises like in the UK last year.

Look, I'm not saying Mainstreet is right and Nanos is wrong (I believe the truth is in the middle). All I'm saying is that the poll average doesn't and shouldn't show the Liberals in first place. Also, yes some polls show a close race or a small lead for the Grits (Leger, Innovative) but others show a large CPC lead. It's possible one group of pollsters is right and the other is off. We had a similar situation in Ontario last year. It remains that even polls that are favourable to the Liberals at best show a close race in terms of seats. While polls favouring the Tories show them close to a majority.

Mainstreet also shows, unsurprisingly, that Conservatives voters are the most committed.

If you want to pick your polling firm, go ahead. I'll personally keep averaging. And doing so shows me that Stephen Harper is really well positioned to win the most seats. I would advise against discarding polls simply because the results don't please you.

I'm also covering this Mainstreet poll because it contains a lot of questions beside the voting intentions. For instance, we learn that 61% of Canadians are against being allowed to wear the Niqab for a citizenship ceremony. And no, this isn't only in Quebec. Although with 70% of people against it, this is the province the least tolerant of wearing this religious sign.

I'm especially interested in the questions regarding what should happen if Harper doesn't win a majority. We learn that public opinion is evenly split (42% on each side, 16% unsure) regarding a Liberals-NDP coalition. Support is the highest in Quebec (50%) and the lowest in Alberta (18%). In Ontario, it's a tie.

The follow up question is even more interesting. If Harper forms the government and is defeated at the House of Commons, 47% of people would want another party to try, while 26% would prefer another election.

So, people seem to think that whoever wins the most seats should at least get to try. And if it fails, then the other party(ies) can try. This is, quite honestly, a position that makes a lot of sense.

We'll likely get a new Forum tomorrow and a new Ekos soon. Throw another Abacus in and we'll be able to better judge the current situation. I think the only thing pollsters agree on is that the NDP is falling. But beyond this, and especially in Ontario, there is a lot of disagreement.

If the election were tomorrow, there is little doubt Stephen Harper and the Conservatives would win the most seats. Yes, some polls show the Liberals first and even increasing (mostly Nanos who has the biggest lead for the Liberals, although Leger and Innovative also have the Grits ahead) but the poll average still shows the Tories ahead. And if you account for the systematic underestimation of the incumbent parties in the polls, you have that the CPC is ahead. Moreover, the popular vote isn't what matters. What really matters are seats. And the Conservatives right now are just more efficient at it.

Let put this clearly: the only way there is currently a race for first place finish between Liberals and Tories is if Justin Trudeau is 8-10 points ahead in Ontario. Nanos used to show exactly this (not this morning though), but there again, the poll average doesn't.

This means that the real battle is for second place between the Liberals and New Democrats. And while some could see it as trivial, it's anything but. The reason being that the Conservatives aren't in a position right now to win a majority. And I don't really see it happening on October 19th. Of course, people were saying the same in 2011 and we all know how it turned out.

Let's assume for a moment that the Tories win but don't get a majority. Stephen Harper is thus asked to form the government. He tries and most likely fails to pass the Throne Speech. We can't really foresee either the Liberals or NDP supporting another Tory minority. Also, for this column, let's forget about scenarios where Harper doesn't actually recall parliament for months.

If Harper is defeated on a motion of confidence, he'll ask for another election. But it's not guaranteed he'd get one, not so close to a general election. In this situation, whoever finished second is most likely asked to try. I personally believe that we'd be in a really messy scenario where no one really knows what would happen. I also believe the General Governor would require some guarantees from Mulcair and Trudeau that they could indeed work together. But aside from those "details", whoever finished second would most likely be asked first.

In other words, the difference between finishing second and third could be the distinction between being prime minister by Christmas or not.

Right now, I have the two parties really close to each other. The NDP has a small edge thanks to Quebec. If this party keeps dropping in this province (and Nanos actually shows the NDP close to being behind the Liberals in Quebec!), third place finish will become guaranteed.

The current odds are 61% for the NDP and 36% for the Liberals - and yes there is about a 3-4% chance of a tie. This is again if the election were tomorrow. But it's not. We could try to guess the trend and what will happen in the last two weeks. However, I'd rather look at it from a different point of view.

First of all, let's look at how many guaranteed ridings the NDP and Liberals each have. By guaranteed, I mean currently projected with a 100% chance. Why? Because these ridings are currently completely safe. So it'd take some massive shifts in voting intentions between now and Oct. 19th to change that.

Right now, the NDP has 16 and the Liberals 23. The NDP used to have a lot in Quebec but the comeback of the Bloc has changed this. At the same time, maybe 100% is too much. Let's look at the number of ridings with a chance of 95% and above. This time, we get 63 NDP and 58 Liberals.

Out of these 63 ridings for the NDP, 30 are in Quebec. For the Liberals, it's only 9 out of the 58 total. There again, it shows the dependence of the NPD on Quebec. I'm not saying this as a bad thing though. A seat is a seat, no matter where it comes from. It's simply important to realize that the NDP's chances most rely on this party finishing first in Quebec. As long as they stay above 30%, they are helped by the electoral system. But the trend really doesn't look good.

Below you have the probabilities of the NDP finishing ahead of the Liberals as a function of the number of NDP seats in Quebec.

As you can see, Thomas Mulcair needs 45 seats if he wants to have more than a 50% chance of finishing second overall. Anything less than this and his chances are decreasing fast. In other words, if his party doesn't win 45 seats in this province, finishing ahead of the Liberals in the total number of seats becomes complicated.

Finally, maybe the best way to look at the current race between the Liberals and NDP is to look at ridings where the two parties are in a race. By race, I mean ridings where the winner has a lead of less than 5 points. And there, the number is surprisingly small: 16! That's right, there are currently only 16 ridings where either the Liberal or NDP candidate is leading by 5 pts or less over the candidate of the other party. What this means is that the NDP and Liberals are fighting each other very indirectly. The NDP needs to stay high in Quebec against the Bloc while the Liberals are fighting the Tories in Ontario. Still, 16 ridings are enough to tip the scale one way or the other.

If the election were tomorrow, I'd bet on the NDP finishing second. On October 19th? I honestly don't know. Trend clearly indicates the Liberals have the momentum but things can still change.

Selon le plus récent sondage Léger publié ce matin, le NPD ne serait qu'à 28% au Québec. Bien sûr, un seul sondage, ce n'est pas la fin du monde. Sauf que ces chiffres ne font que confirmer une tendance débutée il y a environ deux-trois semaines de déclin pour le parti de Thomas Mulcair. Ci-dessous vous avez les sondages au Québec au cours du dernier mois. La tendance est claire et nette. La question est de savoir si elle se poursuivra.

Il est intéressant de constater que tous les partis semblent bénéficier du déclin du NPD. Le PLC dans une moindre mesure comparée aux remontée des Conservateurs et du Bloc. Ce dernier est en train de faire comme la CAQ avec une remontée incroyable et soudaine en fin de campagne. La chute du NPD est telle que la formation orange pourrait ne pas remporter le plus de sièges au Québec, une situation impensable il y a peu de temps. Et probablement un coup fatal aux espoirs du NPD de terminer comme premier parti le 19 octobre. Au rythme où vont les choses, Thomas Mulcair se devra de faire une performance extraordinaire au débat TVA ce soir ainsi qu'à Tout le Monde en Parle.

En même temps, il se peut que c'était quand le NPD était à 45-50% que la situation n'était pas normale. Après tout, avoir les 4 partis au-dessus des 20% est exactement où le Québec était en début d'année dans plusieurs sondages. Il se peut ainsi que ce ne soit qu'une correction et un retour à la normale.

La moyenne des sondages (incluant les récents Léger, Angus-Reid et Abacus entre autres) montre que le NPD reste en tête mais avec une marge bien moindre. Le NPD est à peine au-dessus des 30% et bien loin des 50% de la fin août.

En terme de sièges, nous avons une situation où le NPD reste en tête mais son avance fond rapidement. Ci-dessous vous avez les intervalles min-max (donc couvrant en théorie 100% des scénarios possibles).

NPD: 28-61

Conservateurs: 5-22

Libéraux: 6-29

Bloc: 0-23

Ces intervalles sont très larges pour deux raisons. Premièrement, tel que mentionné, ils incluent absolument tous les scénarios, pas seulement les plus probables. Deuxièmement, avec possiblement quatre partis au-dessus des 20%, le Québec devient une province très indécise et tout peut arriver.

Si l'on ne regarde que les intervalles à 95% (donc en éliminant les 5% de scénarios les plus extrêmes), on obtient:

NPD: 40-54

Conservateurs: 8-16

Libéraux: 10-18

Bloc: 1-11

Là on voit que malgré la chute, le NPD reste 95% assuré de remporter au moins 40 sièges. Mais c'est si l'élection était demain, pas dans près de 3 semaines. Car si Thomas Mulcair n'arrive pas à inverser la tendance, son parti pourrait bien terminer 2e.

Peut-être une meilleure façon de visualiser cela pour le NPD est le graphique ci-dessous. Vous avez les scénarios possibles (i.e: nombre de sièges) au Québec pour le NPD en fonction du pourcentage de votes (axe horizontal) dans cette province. Pour chaque pourcentage, il y a plusieurs scénarios en fonction de la distribution et efficacité du vote.

Nombre de sièges possibles pour le NPD en fonction du pourcentage de votes au Québec

Comme vous pouvez le voir, le NPD est proche de la zone où il pourrait ne plus remporter une majorité de sièges au Québec. Le seuil semble être aux alentours des 26-30% (juste sous le résultat du NPD selon Léger). 

Au final, le NPD reste favori au Québec mais la tendance est incroyablement négative. Au point où l'on peut réalistiquement commencer à envisager que ce parti ne termine pas premier le 19 octobre au soir. Un scénario absolument inimaginable il n'y a que 3 semaines de cela.

Yesterday, I wrote an article about the vote splitting occurring in this election between the Liberals and the NDP. In English and in French.

The main result was that the Conservatives are currently winning 28 seats thanks to it.

Here is the list of the 28 ridings affected. There are technically 72 ridings where CPC is leading but NDP+LPC would be greater, but in most of them, the lead of the Conservative candidate would not be overcome by having a unique candidate (or coalition) between the other two (namely because not all NDP voters for instance would vote Liberals).

Central Nova

New Brunswick Southwest

Saint John-Rothesay

Tobique-Mactaquac

Jonquière

Richmond-Arthabaska

Aurora-Oak Ridges-Richmond Hill

Brampton Centre

Brampton North

Essex

Glengarry-Prescott-Russell

Kenora

Markham--Stouffville

Oakville

Oshawa

Calgary Confederation

Edmonton Manning

Edmonton Mill Woods

Edmonton Riverbend

Lethbridge

Coquitlam-Port Coquitlam

Fleetwood-Port Kells

Kamloops-Thompson--Cariboo

Kootenay--Columbia

Pitt Meadows-Maple Ridge

South Surrey-White Rock

Steveston-Richmond East

Nunavut

In these ridings, if the NDP and Liberals were to run a single candidate, they would likely win. 28 out of 338 isn't that much, but it does currently make the difference between Harper finishing first and third.