Sutcliffe campaign's internal poll shows sizable lead for incumbent mayor

With less than two weeks left in the campaign, Ottawa Mayor Mark Sutcliffe has opened a sizable lead among decided voters, according to internal polling numbers from Abacus Data.

Sutcliffe’s campaign commissioned the poll, which was collected online from 1,000 respondents in late September by Abacus chief pollster David Coletto on behalf of the Sutcliffe campaign.

The online poll surveyed 1,000 eligible voters between Sept. 25 to 30, where respondents were asked to choose between the four front-runners in the mayoral campaign: the incumbent Sutcliffe, long-serving city councillor Jeff Leiper, economist Neil Saravanamuttoo and homebuilder Alex Lawson.

“If the Ottawa municipal election were held today, and these were the candidates for Mayor on your ballot, who would you vote for?” the survey asked, while providing a brief description of each candidate.

Sutcliffe held a 36-point lead over the closest challenger among decided voters, according to the poll, with 52 per cent of decided voters choosing Sutcliffe. Leiper was at 16 per cent and Saravanamuttoo and Lawson both at 14 per cent.

Another four per cent of decided voters said they would vote for someone else among the 14 candidates running for mayor.

The data for decided voters excluded those who are undecided and those who said they would not vote. Twenty-three per cent of all respondents said they were undecided.

There were 755 respondents who said they had decided on a candidate and 534 respondents listed as “likely” voters, defined by Abacus as decided voters who say they are “absolutely certain to vote.”

Half (50 per cent) of those likely voters chose Sutcliffe, with Saravanamuttoo edging into second place with 17 per cent, Leiper at 16 per cent and Lawson at 13 per cent. Three per cent said they would vote for someone else.

Among all 1,000 eligible voters surveyed by Abacus, Sutcliffe led with 39 per cent over Leiper at 12 per cent, Saravanamuttoo at 11 per cent and Lawson at 10 per cent.

Three per cent said they would vote for a different candidate and two per cent said they would not cast a ballot in this year’s municipal election, which is being held on Oct. 26.

Sutcliffe held a 27-point lead over his nearest challenger in data collected from all eligible voters, according to the Abacus poll.

The survey was completed online, with respondents drawn from several online research panels through the PureSpectrum network, according to Abacus Data.

“Because the sample comes from online panels and is not a random probability sample, a margin of error cannot be calculated,” Abacus said. “A comparable probability sample of 1,000 would carry a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.”

The comparable margins are plus or minus 3.6 points for the 755 decided voters surveyed and plus or minus 4.2 points for the 534 likely voters.

Abacus noted that the poll was commissioned and paid for by the Sutcliffe campaign.

The results are similar to recent polling numbers that show Sutcliffe leading among decided voters, while a significant number of voters remain undecided as election day approaches. Special advance voting was held from Oct. 1 to 4 and another early voting day will be held on Oct. 16.

A Nanos Research poll conducted between Oct. 4 to 8 for CTV News Ottawa showed Sutcliffe leading with 49 per cent support from decided voters, with 31 per cent choosing Leiper, 12 per cent choosing Saravanamuttoo and seven per cent choosing Lawson.

Among all 762 randomly-selected voters surveyed by Nanos earlier this month, 23 per cent were undecided, according to CTV.

Sutcliffe led with 41 per cent among all voters surveyed by Nanos, with Leiper at 24 per cent, Saravanamuttoo at six per cent and Lawson at five per cent.

A poll conducted by ElectRight on Sept. 17 and 18, commissioned by Ottawa Compass and iPolitics, showed Sutcliffe at 35 per cent, Leiper at 19 per cent, Saravanamuttoo at 10 per cent and Lawson at four per cent.

According to that poll, 28 per cent of about 600 respondents were undecided.

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