Poll position

A Decima Research poll which plans to track the same pool of voters throughout the campaign suggests that as consistent as the numbers have seemed so far, there's still an awful lot of room for change:

43 per cent said their vote is decided and won't change; 20 per cent said they're leaning toward one party but could change; 28 per cent said they are certain to vote but don't know for whom...

Among unsettled voters, the tendency is to lean toward the Liberals (32 per cent) and the NDP (24 per cent) rather than the Conservatives (23) or the Bloc (7)...

Among those who are decided or leaning, the Liberals had 34 per cent support, the Conservatives 26 per cent, the NDP 19 and the Bloc Quebecois 13 per cent. Those numbers are comparable to Decima's weekly random telephone poll.

There's obviously some downside for the NDP in the relative lack of voters committed already to the party. That said, the 28 per cent of voters with no current leaning represent enough to swing an awful lot of seats. And if the pool of completely undecided voters looks anything like the leaners to this point, then the NDP has a chance to win a lot more votes than they're credited with under most of the polls to date.

It's no surprise that the Cons' base gives them a starting advantage over the NDP. But so far, the Cons are apparently doing the worst job of any national party in swaying undecideds. Unless Harper can change that pattern, the Libs don't appear to face much challenge to a continued minority government, and that in turn should leave the NDP in a position of strength rather than on the wrong end of an anti-Harper stampede.