CMA “delighted” as health care dominates voter attention during election

May 5, 2011

CMA President Jeff Turnbull says the association had one major goal entering this spring’s federal election campaign, and by the time Canadians voted May 2 it was clear that goal had been met.

“We wanted to make sure that health care was a top-of-mind issue as people marked their ballots, and on May 2 Nanos [Research] reported that health care was the major election issue for voters, and by a large margin,” he said.The final May 1 voter tracking poll conducted by Nanos Research showed that health care was the major election issue for 31.5% of those polled, compared with 23.4% for jobs and the economy, and 7.2% for the environment. Two weeks into the five-week campaign, those numbers had stood at 25% for jobs/economy, and 23.4% for health care.

“Overall, we’re delighted with the priority and prominence health care received throughout the campaign,” Turnbull said. “Now we are going to turn our attention to ensuring that Canadians’ number one concern remains a priority for the federal government as well.”

Turnbull said the CMA set three goals when the election was called:

• to raise public awareness on major health care issues
• to ensure all parties and their candidates provided a clear vision for the future of health care
• to deliver the CMA’s message about health care transformation throughout the campaign

To get its message across to members, the CMA launched an election website on March 27, the day after the election was called. By the end of the campaign the website contained lists of party commitments regarding health care, as well as parties’ responses to a CMA questionnaire about health care issues.

A President’s Message, sent the week after the election was called, outlined the structure of the CMA’s non-partisan campaign, and thousands of members received emails announcing all-candidates’ meetings in their ridings.

The CMA’s health care transformation message was also delivered directly to voters during the election campaign – Turnbull was interviewed by numerous media outlets, ranging from the Globe and Mail and CTV news to a Chinese-language newspaper in Toronto. As well, the CMA sent out several press releases, including a joint release sent with the Assembly of First Nations April 26. Results of regional polls on health care conducted for the CMA were released throughout the election campaign.

“Many issues were raised, from the cost of new jet fighters to the role of immigration to the need for new jails,” Turnbull said of the 2011 campaign, “but the CMA was successful in guaranteeing that the parties and candidates were not allowed to forget about health care for very long.”

Forward any comments about this article to: cmanews@cma.ca.