The closing stretch: is the Liberal advantage as solid as it seems?

The campaign is drawing to a close, and all the new polls are pointing at the same thing: a large PLQ lead with the CAQ on the rebound. This projection will likely be the second last one, with the final one coming on Monday morning or so, with all the final adjustments made.

The numbers are here:
PQ     27-31% [median 28.4] (6.2) 41-53 seats [median 45] (8)
PLQ    37-41% [median 39.3] (2.1) 61-75 seats [median 69] (3)
CAQ    19-23% [median 20.9] (7.4)  6-15 seats [median  9] (5)
QS      7-11% [median  9.3] (1.0)  2- 3 seats [median  2] (=)
ON      0- 1% [median  0.6] (0.2)  0- 0 seats [median  0] (=)
PVQ     0- 1% [median  0.6] (0.1)  0- 0 seats [median  0] (=)
Other   0- 2% [median  0.8] (0.2)  0- 1 seats [median  0] (=)

Now is the time to investigate whether the Liberal lead really is as strong as it looks. On paper, a 10+ percentage point lead seems somewhat insurmountable. Alison Redford overcame a small 2pp lead in the polling average, and even Christy Clark "only" overcame an 8pp margin.

The first thing to look at is "likely voters." As many elections have shown us, the people who answer polls may not be the same people who vote. That said, both Ipsos Reid and EKOS have included a "likely voter" formula, and neither shows a bounce for the PQ. I've used their "likely voter" numbers in the poll projection either, so hopefully turnout won't throw this off as far as previous elections.

Looking at recent trends, the PLQ is clearly stagnant or even declining slightly from their peak position. Two weeks ago, they were forecast between 39-44%. Now, that has decreased to 37-41%. A Couillard majority is NOT guaranteed.

However, in the same period, the PQ has had a disastrous stretch, from a forecast of 32-37% to just 27-31%. Those ranges don't even overlap! The only thing that the PQ can hope for now is an incumbency bonus. Usually, incumbent members or governments get a bounce at the ballot box, and they perform better than polls suggest. I may tweak the numbers slightly to account for that in the final update. At this point, though, it looks like the Liberal lead is fairly safe. It would take a small miracle for Marois to pull out a victory now.

As for the CAQ, incumbency could really be a huge factor for them, especially now that they're on a clear upswing. It's highly likely that the CAQ will save more of their seats than most people expect. The same thing happened with their predecessors, the ADQ, in the 2008 election. The projection accounts for that, and so the CAQ seat count is a bit on the high side. That number might rise further by Monday. Legault's second debate performance really saved his hide.

For now, though, Politically Uncorrect projects a LIBERAL MAJORITY of 13.