Carney’s Liberals hold narrow lead over Conservatives as 2025 ends: poll

Approval of the Liberal government under Prime Minister Mark Carney is 15 points ahead of the party overall, according to the new Ipsos poll conducted for Global News.

New polling suggests more Canadians approve of Prime Minister Mark Carney than his Liberal party, which continues to hold a slight lead over the federal Conservatives as 2025 draws to a close.

The Ipsos poll conducted exclusively for Global News and released Tuesday shows 40 per cent of voters would cast a ballot for the Liberals if an election were held tomorrow, compared to 37 per cent for the Conservatives.

Those numbers are down three and two points, respectively, since September, while the NDP and Bloc Québécois have each risen two points over the same time period to nine per cent.

Approval of the Liberal government under Carney, according to the poll, sits at 55 per cent — 15 points ahead of the party overall.

“Obviously (Carney) has had quite an effect on public opinion personally, but the interesting thing is it hasn’t really seemed to have gone over to his party. It’s really more attached to him,” Darrell Bricker, CEO of Ipsos Public Affairs, said in an interview.

“The gap between the Liberals and the Conservatives … is about what it was during the last election, but Carney’s own personal performance is actually quite strong. And in this era of personality politics, when people really do look at the leaders, that’s a real advantage for him.”

Ipsos polled over 1,500 Canadian adults last week for the poll, which has a 3.1-point margin of error that is about the same size as the gap between the Liberals and Conservatives.

Carney’s approval of 55 per cent is driven almost entirely by Liberal voters, 91 per cent of whom said they approve, compared to 58 per cent of New Democrats and just 27 per cent of Conservatives.