Liberals Lead Conservatives 43–32, but Under-35 Voters Are Almost Tied: Liaison Poll

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Canada’s federal political landscape looks comfortable for the Liberals from a distance and far more competitive up close. Liaison Strategies’ latest federal tracker places the Liberals at 43% among decided and leaning voters, 11 points ahead of the Conservatives at 32%, with the NDP at 13%. Yet that national advantage largely disappears among Canadians aged 18 to 34. In that group, Liberal support sits at 30%, Conservative support at 29% and NDP support at 26%.

The contrast reveals two very different political contests operating at once. Older voters and women are helping produce a sizeable Liberal national lead, while younger Canadians are divided almost evenly among three parties. Just as importantly, the polling was conducted largely before the latest escalation in the Canada-U.S. trade conflict, making its timing unusually significant.

The 11-Point Liberal Lead Has Become More Than a One-Week Result

The national numbers are striking partly because they have shown considerable stability. Liaison’s August 24 tracker puts the Liberals at 43%, Conservatives at 32% and NDP at 13% among decided and leaning voters. The previous tracker, released August 17, produced exactly the same three numbers. One week earlier, on August 10, the Liberals were at 44% and the Conservatives at 31%, creating a 13-point gap. The August 3 tracker had the race somewhat closer at 43% to 34%. Taken together, those readings suggest the current Liberal advantage is not being produced by a single unusual polling week.

The comparison with the April 2025 federal election is even more revealing. Elections Canada recorded 43.8% of valid votes for the Liberals and 41.3% for the Conservatives, a national difference of only 2.5 percentage points. The newest Liaison reading therefore depicts a substantially wider separation than voters produced at the last general election. That does not mean an election held now would necessarily reproduce an 11-point result. Polls measure opinion at the time interviews are conducted, while campaigns, turnout and local races can materially change the eventual outcome.

Under 35, the Two Biggest Parties Are Separated by Just One Point

The headline national lead almost disappears when the electorate is narrowed to people aged 18 to 34. Liaison puts the Liberals at 30% in this age group and the Conservatives at 29%, a difference of only one percentage point. The NDP is close behind at 26%. Rather than a conventional Liberal-Conservative contest, the youngest adult voting bloc currently resembles a three-way race in which no party reaches even one-third support. That fragmentation is one of the most consequential details in the entire poll because it is dramatically different from the national picture.

There has also been noticeable movement from the previous Liaison tracker, although it should be treated cautiously. On August 17, the Liberals had 34% among 18-to-34-year-olds, compared with 26% for the Conservatives and 25% for the NDP. The latest figures therefore show the gap compressing considerably. Because age-group results are based on a smaller portion of the overall sample, week-to-week changes can be much more volatile than national numbers. The safest conclusion is not that one party suddenly gained control of young voters, but that none of the three leading parties currently has a decisive advantage among them.

Youth Support Matters Most When It Turns Into Votes

A closely divided youth electorate could become politically valuable, but voting intention and actual turnout are different things. Elections Canada’s analysis of the 2025 general election found that turnout among voters aged 18 to 24 was 55.9%. Participation among those aged 25 to 34 was somewhat higher at 59.6%. By comparison, turnout reached 73.4% among voters aged 55 to 64 and peaked at 77.6% among people aged 65 to 74. Overall turnout in the 2025 election was 68.0% of eligible electors.

Those differences help explain why strong support among older Canadians can have an outsized effect on an election result. A party that attracts younger voters still has to convert that interest into ballots. The 2025 numbers were encouraging for youth participation—turnout among 18-to-24-year-olds rose from 46.7% in 2021—but the age gap remained substantial. For political parties, that turns the under-35 contest into two challenges at once: winning preference and generating participation. A one-point advantage among young adults can look impressive in a demographic table yet produce less electoral impact if substantially fewer members of that group ultimately vote.

The NDP Is Far Stronger With Young Canadians Than Its National Number Suggests

The NDP’s 13% national support can obscure what is happening among younger voters. Liaison finds the party at 26% among those aged 18 to 34—exactly twice its national figure—and at 22% in British Columbia. That places the New Democrats only four points behind the Liberals and three behind the Conservatives among young adults. For a party that received just 6.3% of valid votes nationally in the 2025 federal election, the latest numbers suggest a potential base for rebuilding, even if that support is far from evenly distributed across the electorate.

Leader Avi Lewis also performs considerably better with some of the same groups. Liaison records his national favourability at 31%, with 30% unfavourable, but his favourability rises to 46% among 18-to-34-year-olds and 44% in British Columbia. Lewis has led the NDP only since March 29, 2026, when party members elected him on the first ballot with 56% of leadership votes. The alignment between his stronger demographic ratings and the party’s stronger youth numbers is noteworthy. It does not establish that Lewis personally caused the increase, but it illustrates where the NDP currently appears most competitive.

Women and Older Voters Are Building the Liberal National Advantage

The strongest Liberal margins appear in groups that also make up dependable parts of the electorate. Liaison finds the Liberals leading the Conservatives 49% to 25% among women, a 24-point advantage. Among people aged 65 and older, the gap is even larger: 57% Liberal against 26% Conservative. Those figures provide much of the explanation for how an almost tied contest among younger Canadians can coexist with an 11-point Liberal national lead. The Liberal coalition is simply much less evenly divided in some of the groups where it performs best.

Turnout patterns make the age advantage particularly significant. Elections Canada found participation of 77.6% among 65-to-74-year-olds in the 2025 election, compared with 55.9% among voters aged 18 to 24. Women also recorded slightly higher overall participation than men in 2025, at 68.5% versus 67.4%. Liaison’s previous August 17 tracker showed the same underlying pattern, with Liberals ahead 47% to 27% among women and 55% to 27% among voters 65 and older. The newest numbers therefore look less like a sudden demographic change than a continuation—and slight strengthening—of an established source of Liberal support.

Carney’s Ratings Remain an Asset While Poilievre Faces a Tougher Personal Picture

Prime Minister Mark Carney continues to record positive job-approval numbers in Liaison’s tracker. The latest reading shows 59% approving of his performance and 31% disapproving. That represents only a small change from August 17, when approval stood at 60%. His ratings also vary sharply across the country. Approval reaches 76% in Quebec, while Alberta remains his weakest region, with 39% approving and 56% disapproving. The contrast mirrors the broader regional polarization that has characterized recent federal voting patterns.

Pierre Poilievre faces a more difficult set of personal numbers in the same tracker. Liaison records 34% with a favourable impression of the Conservative leader and 54% with an unfavourable impression. A week earlier, those numbers were 35% favourable and 53% unfavourable. One methodological distinction matters: Carney is being measured through job approval while Poilievre is being measured through favourability, so the figures should not be treated as perfectly interchangeable ratings. Even so, they help explain the different political environments facing the two leaders. Carney enters the latest period with majority approval nationally, while Poilievre continues to face a substantially larger unfavourable than favourable rating.

The Under-35 Tie Deserves More Caution Than the National Lead

Liaison’s national tracker is based on a random sample of 1,526 Canadians interviewed from August 9 through August 22. The firm used interactive voice response technology and random-digit dialling across both cellular and landline networks. Results were weighted to demographic targets from the 2021 Census. Liaison reports a margin of error of plus or minus 2.51 percentage points for the full sample, 19 times out of 20. Those details make the 11-point national Liberal-Conservative gap much larger than the poll’s reported overall sampling uncertainty.

The under-35 result needs a different interpretation because it comes from a subgroup rather than all 1,526 respondents. The American Association for Public Opinion Research notes that subgroup estimates carry larger sampling errors because fewer respondents are involved. It also stresses that election polling is best understood as a snapshot rather than a prediction. That distinction is especially important when the difference is only 30% to 29%. Describing the Liberals and Conservatives as almost tied among 18-to-34-year-olds is therefore appropriate; declaring either party clearly ahead among younger voters would go beyond what such a narrow subgroup difference can establish.

The Trade-War Shock Arrived Too Late to Be Fully Reflected

Timing may ultimately prove to be the most important limitation of this tracker. Although interviews continued through August 22, Liaison says only one day of tracking occurred after the latest major Canada-U.S. trade escalation. On August 21, the United States imposed 50% tariffs on roughly $20 billion worth of Canadian goods after negotiations failed, according to Reuters. Prime Minister Carney subsequently suspended further negotiations, and on August 22 Canada announced dollar-for-dollar retaliatory tariffs on selected U.S. goods scheduled to take effect September 8.

The situation continued changing after Liaison’s fieldwork had already ended. On August 24, Reuters reported that U.S. President Donald Trump was threatening 50% tariffs on Canadian-made cars, trucks and auto parts beginning January 1, 2027. None of that later development could have influenced respondents interviewed before the weekend. The 43%-to-32% result is therefore better understood as a picture of Canadian politics immediately before the trade confrontation intensified, rather than a verdict on how voters responded to it. That makes the next full polling wave unusually important: it will provide the first clearer indication of whether the confrontation strengthens the government, benefits the opposition or leaves the national balance largely unchanged.

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