By DAVID AKIN PARLIAMENTARY BUREAU CHIEF
Prime Minister Stephen Harper's Conservative Party holds a commanding lead over his rivals, according to a new poll released late Thursday.(REUTERS/Blair Gable)
OTTAWA - The country's 41st general election campaign will get underway Saturday with Prime Minister Stephen Harper's Conservative Party holding a commanding lead over his rivals, according to a new poll released late Thursday.
Harper's government is expected to lose a confidence vote in the House of Commons around 2 p.m. EDT Friday. A government source told QMI Agency that Harper is "expected" to ask Governor General David Johnston on Saturday to dissolve Parliament for an election that's expected to be on May 2.
Harper hits the campaign trail with the wind at his back, according to a new Ipsos Reid poll.
Ipsos Reid shows the Conservatives are the choice of 43% of Canadians as the campaign opens.
Traditionally, voter support of above 40% translates into a majority government.
The Liberals trail badly at 24% under their leader, Michael Ignatieff, 19 percentage points behind the Conservatives. In the 2008 general election campaign, leader Stephane Dion took the Liberals to their lowest popular vote since Confederation at just over 26%.
Ipsos has the NDP at 16% and the Greens at 6%.
In Quebec, the Bloc Quebecois has a commanding lead with 41%, followed by the Conservatives at 25%, the Liberals at 18%, the NDP at 13% and the Greens at 3%.
In Ontario, the Conservatives have a 46%-30% lead over the Liberals and in B.C., it¹s an astounding 50%-22% lead.
The NDP has the support of 16% of Ontarians and 20% of British Columbians.
The poll was taken March 22-23, after the budget was tabled and after the Conservatives had been buffeted by allegations that former top PMO advisor Bruce Carson was facing the allegations of influence peddling and after a series of parliamentary hearings concluded the Harper government was in contempt of Parliament.
And yet, those ethics issues and several others seem to have, if anything, helped the Tories.
For the poll, Ipsos Reid surveyed 1,001 people by phone and says their national results are accurate to within 3.1 percentage points 19 times out of 20.
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