Premier popularity poll puts Sask.’s Wall at top, Ontario’s Wynne at bottom

[Premier Brad Wall is the most popular premier according to a new Angus Reid poll. Kathleen Wynne of Ontario, however, sits in dead last. Photo: The Canadian Press]

Saskatchewan Premier Brad Wall’s approval rating dropped nine points since the last Angus Reid poll, but the prairie leader still managed to top the popularity ratings of every Canadian premier — sitting at 57 per cent.

The quarterly Angus Reid Institute (ARI) analysis is based on a survey of more than 5,000 Canadian adults.

Wall, currently on a trip to China and South Korea to promote his province, has been taken to task recently for his comments concerning a carbon tax.

Scientist and environmentalist David Suzuki recently called out the premier for being a climate denier.

Wall has vehemently stated he believes in climate change but does not want Canadians to have to pay up for environmental damage considering they only account for 1.6 per cent of global CO2 emissions.

The summer has been rough for Wall. Protests surrounding the potential sale of the province’s telecommunications company, SaskTel, have dogged his government. A highly-trusted cabinet minister has also pleaded guilty to drunk driving charges. Don McNorris, once the deputy premier, was behind the wheel of a government vehicle when he was arrested. His blood-alcohol level was 2½ times the legal limit of .08 per cent.

Most disturbingly, came the shooting death of an indigenous man, Colten Boushie, which seemed to break open Saskatchewan’s seething racist underbelly.

Coming in right behind Wall is Manitoba PC Leader Brian Pallister at 53 per cent. Pallister’s Tories ended a 16-year power dynasty for the New Democrats in the provincial election in April.

Some of Pallister’s promises include: cutting the sales tax from eight to seven per cent by 2020, shortening wait times in hospital emergency rooms, boosting income tax brackets by the rate of inflation within their first full budget year and increasing funding for home-based daycares.

Rounding off the top three is Nova Scotia’s Liberal Premier Stephen McNeil, sitting at 41 per cent.

B.C.’s top boss has ‘bounce’

According to the Angus Reid report, the premier with the “bounce” this quarter is B.C.’s Christy Clark (at 34 per cent).

“Clark’s imposition of a 15% tax on foreign buyers of Metro Vancouver homes was among other things, a political gamble, one that for now, appears to be paying off,” stated the pollster.

Clark’s popularity went up seven points since the last survey, released in May.

The other big story of this survey is still Newfoundland and Labrador’s Dwight Ball, who dropped 39 percentage points since he hit a peak in February, and is second last on this survey to Ontario’s Kathleen Wynne.

Ball captured a resounding majority government six months ago, but then unveiled an austerity budget of cuts that included a tax on books. Only last week, Paul Lane was kicked out of the Liberal provincial caucus after proclaiming he wouldn’t vote for the spending plan due to a controversial deficit reduction levy.

Ball has reassured voters no more major budget cuts are coming in the fall.

Ball’s 21 per cent only nudged past Wynne for last place. She sits at a cool 20 per cent approval rating. The Ontario leader’s bottom ranking isn’t a surprise — she was recently booed at a ploughing competition in the countryside.

Since the majority sale of Hydro One, bloated electricity rates being charged to consumers have taken over headlines across the province.

Wynne’s administration has promised a few tax cuts to offset the rising electricity costs, but many experts have weighed in and pointed out that the province’s cap-and-trade proposal to reduce greenhouse gas emissions would erase most of those savings to consumers.

Full Angus Reid Institute Premier Approval List for September 2016:

• Brad Wall (Saskatchewan): 57 per cent
  

• Brian Pallister (Manitoba): 53 per cent
  

• Stephen McNeil (N.S.): 38 per cent
  

• Christy Clark (B.C.): 34 per cent
  

• Rachel Notley (Alberta): 31 per cent
  

• Phillipe Couillard (Quebec): 23 per cent
  

• Brian Gallant (P.E.I): 24 per cent
  

• Dwight Ball (Nfld & Labrador ): 21 per cent
  

• Kathleen Wynne (Ontario): 20 per cent