Friday, November 27, 2009

Healthcare Top Issue Once Again

On Tuesday, Nanos released a new poll asking Canadians what their top issues were. Between November 7 and November 10, 1,005 Canadians were surveyed.

Healthcare took the cake with 27%, up two points from a similar poll taken a month ago.

The economy has dropped to 24% as a top issue, down six points from the last poll and down about 30 points from earlier this year. Apparently, Canadians believe the economy is doing fine and they are returning to more traditional concerns.

The environment was at 9% and education at 4%, more or less unchanged.

One wonders whether the political parties, the Conservatives in particular, will change their message. A puzzling aspect about this is that the federal government is not the level of government responsible for healthcare - the provinces are. And whenever the federal government does try to get involved to a greater extent than they already are, the provinces object. It is a lose-lose situation for federal parties, as if they give healthcare a priority, they can't really do all that much about it, other than give the provinces more money.

Anyway, it is another sign that Canadian politics is returning to normal.