OTTAWA - A new poll suggests the federal Liberals and Conservatives are in a dead heat, while Tory support is dropping in some parts of the country and among women.
The Canadian Press Harris-Decima survey put the Liberals at 33 per cent and the Conservatives at 32.
The NDP was at 14 per cent, the Greens at 10, and the Bloc Quebecois at nine.
It suggests the Tories trail the Liberals by five percentage points among women overall and by 12 points among urban women.
Jeff Walker, senior vice-president of Harris-Decima, said that's the important finding.
"Women are moving back toward the Liberals, where they had been leaning toward the Conservatives leading up to and then at the election in (October.)
"It's women overall, but in particular, among urban-dwelling women, the Liberals are ahead of the Conservatives by 12 points now and they were even at the time of the last election."
Walker said the arrival of Michael Ignatieff as Liberal leader seems to be one key to this shift. The economy is the other.
Many traditional Liberals abandoned the party under Stephane Dion, Walker noted.
"Having Ignatieff as leader of the Liberals changes that.
"The second thing is - rightly or wrongly - the government of the day always wears difficult times. Right now we're in difficult economic times."
The Conservatives have also seen their support in Quebec cut in half. The Bloc remains in front with 39 per cent support, while the Liberals have moved up to 32. The Tories have slid to 13, the NDP are at nine and the Greens at six.
Walker said the uproar over proposed Tory cuts to cultural spending hurt them in the province, as did Stephen Harper's harsh condemnation of the Bloc as separatists during the turmoil over the proposed opposition coalition before Christmas.
The Liberals were ahead in Ontario, where NDP support has sagged into a low-teens tie with the Greens.
The telephone poll of 2,000 people was conducted Feb. 26 to March 8, and is considered accurate to within 2.2 percentage points 19 times out of 20.
