Half of Canadians say it would be unethical for Carney to get majority with floor crossers: poll

OTTAWA — Half of Canadians believe it would be unethical for Mark Carney’s Liberal government to achieve a majority by attracting opposition MP floor crossers, according to a new poll .

And, two months after two Conservative MPs crossed the floor to the governing Liberals , new data from a Postmedia-Leger poll suggest that voters’ feelings about party defectors are a political Rorschach test.

When respondents were asked if MPs should be allowed to switch parties, the answer was yes from 62 per cent of Liberal voters, who recently saw their party grow to within one seat of a majority thanks to Conservative floor crossers Chris d’Entremont and Michael Ma. Nearly the same proportion of NDP voters (61 per cent) think the same.

But 63 per cent of Conservatives say MPs should be barred from being able to change parties.

“Supporters of the Liberal party will be pretty ambivalent about it, going, ‘hey, it’s allowed in our system’ and ‘it’s part of democracy’,” Leger executive vice-president Andrew Enns said in an interview.

“Conservatives obviously are a little more exercised by it… and see it more through that negative lens.”

But with the Liberals within reach of a razor-thin majority, 51 per cent of respondents say it would be “unethical” for the government to do so by adding more floor-crossing MPs.

Even among Liberal respondents, 46 per cent think it would be ethical, the poll shows.

Enns said Canadians’ mixed views on the idea that Carney could obtain a majority government by attracting opposition MPs to his party is a warning sign to the prime minister.

Since Ma joined Liberal ranks in mid-December, many Liberals have suggested there could be more floor crossers joining the party .

“The Liberals need to be a bit cautious because generally, Canadian feel that’s a little bit outside of what they perceive the ‘rules’ are,” Enns said, adding that the Liberals have been a bit “cavalier” when discussing potential floor crossers.

The poll, which surveyed 1,611 people online between Jan. 23 and 26, suggests Canadians overall are divided on the ethics of floor crossing. While 42 per cent believe it should be allowed, 38 per cent disagree with the practice.

Canadians are even more divided when it comes to what should happen if an MP decides to swap seats.

In Canada’s parliamentary democracy, federal elections are a series of 343 riding-level elections in which voters choose a member of Parliament, not a party.

MPs are free to choose to represent the party of their choice and to swap political colour at will until the next election.

But most Canadians think there should be a different process, although they don’t agree on what it should be, the poll suggests.

The survey shows 38 per cent of respondents believe a floor crosser should be first required to run in a byelection under the new party banner to ensure support from constituents, while 26 per cent think the MP should have to sit as an Independent until the next general election.

Only 20 per cent of respondents said an MP should be allowed to swap parties with no conditions, as is the current case.

“There’s no consensus,” Enns said. “So, it would be a bit of a mug’s game for any governing party to come in and say, ‘we’re going to put some rules in place’. ”

“When I look at these numbers, it would be challenging for a government to get rules actually right for what the public is sort of expecting here, because the public’s a bit all over the map.”

If there’s one thing that a majority of poll respondents agreed on, it’s that parties should not be allowed to offer inducements to attract floor crossers, with 67 per cent against the idea of a party using offers of cabinet positions or other career bonuses to entice MPs to switch. Eighty-seven per cent of respondents said party-swapping MPs should be required by law to disclose if they were offered anything to switch.

A majority of respondents said they believed that a valid reason for crossing would be a personal or policy difference of opinion with the original party or its leader. But a plurality of respondents said floor crossers are primarily motivated to defect by a desire to advance their political career, versus 37 per cent who believed the reasons were likelier to be personal conviction.

Half said they would be less likely to vote for an MP they had previously supported who crossed the floor, while only six per cent said it would make them more likely to, with the rest saying it would have no effect or didn’t know.

National Post

cnardi@postmedia.com

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