Tory maintaining lead in mayoral race: poll

John Tory maintains a seven point lead in the Toronto mayoral race over Doug Ford according to a new Forum Research poll conducted exclusively for CityNews.

The poll found that 38 per cent of Torontonians would vote for Tory while 31 per cent would vote for Doug Ford.

“Because nothing much has happened; it’s been very low-key, while the Ford thing is being sorted out. We had a seven-point lead for John Tory over Doug Ford, and we still have the seven same points,” said Lorne Bozinoff, CEO of Forum Research.

Olivia Chow remained in third place but saw her numbers increase from 19 per cent last week to 25 per cent.

“[Tory and Ford] are both down a little bit, they’re both down three points, respectively, but there’s still the gap of seven points, and the difference is we have Olivia Chow coming up and she’s had a pretty good week,” said Bozinoff.

Tory also came up on top when it came to approval rating with 64 per cent, followed by Chow at 54 per cent and then Ford with 45 per cent.

Bozinoff said the numbers show Ford is winning the support Ford Nation and emerged from the 10 days since tapping in for his brother Rob Ford on the mayoral ballot with relatively strong numbers. The next test will be Tuesday’s mayoral debate, the first debate Doug Ford will participate in since becoming a candidate.

“He has held on to his lead there, and then finally, he’s got to come out with a really strong performance in the debate tonight,” said Bozinoff.

The debate, hosted by the York South-Weston community associations, begins at 7:30 p.m.

The Forum poll, which was conducted Sept. 22, has a margin of error of plus or minus three per cent 19 times out of 20 from a sample size of 1,164 Toronto voters.

Forum found just four per cent of respondents were undecided.

“This campaign has already gone on for nine months … I think they have made up their mind, they may not be tied to that decision, and they may change their minds, but I think they have made an initial decision,” said Bozinoff.

Tory also maintained his front-runner status in a poll from Mainstreet Technologies.

That poll, conducted Sunday, shows John Tory leading with 40 per cent of the vote.

Torontonians head to the polls on Oct. 27.

Forum Research Poll Sept. 22, 2014

Mobile users click here to view the full poll results.

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