Manitoba’s Pallister Expected to Win Second Term in Vote

(Bloomberg) -- Manitoba Premier Brian Pallister and his Progressive Conservative Party are expected to cruise to a second term as voters in the Canadian province head to the polls Tuesday.

The former insurance company executive became premier in 2016, toppling the New Democratic Party after almost 17 years in power. Since then, Pallister has taken a hard stance on moving to a balanced budget. At the same time, he was able to achieve his election promise of cutting the provincial sales tax by 1 percentage point to 7% on July 1.

The Conservatives have been able to maintain steady support, with the latest poll from Probe Research, commissioned by the Winnipeg Free Press and CTV Winnipeg, showing the ruling party at 40% support, trailed by the NDP at 29%, the Liberals with 18% and the Green Party at 10%.

“Very little has changed in terms of voter intentions really for last month, years even,” Mary Agnes Welch, principal with Probe Research, said in a phone interview. The PC party has a strong base “and the opposition parties are pretty far behind them province wide. It’s a little closer in Winnipeg, where the NDP and the Tories are roughly neck and neck.”

A second term for Pallister would solidify Conservative administrations in key provinces of Ontario, Alberta and Manitoba, increasing opposition to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s push for a national carbon tax and increased spending on social programs.

Pallister moved the election up a year from the fixed election date, pushing Manitobans to the polls a month before the federal election on Oct. 21.

The incumbent premier is running on a platform of broad tax cuts and now plans to balance the budget by 2022, two years earlier than previously planned.

Pallister’s main opponent is NDP leader Wab Kinew, a former CBC journalist. He’s running on a platform of undoing health-care cuts made by the incumbent government, and raising the province’s minimum wage to C$15 ($11.33) an hour.

Manitoba Liberal leader and former political adviser Dougald Lamont’s promises include founding a Manitoba Business Development Bank to support business investment, and rebuilding the provincial health-care system.

Polls close at 8 p.m. local time Tuesday.

To contact the reporter on this story: Ashley Robinson in Winnipeg (Non BLP Loc) at arobinson193@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: David Scanlan at dscanlan@bloomberg.net, Chris Fournier

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