Canadians supported the coalition in January 2009.

Polls two years ago showed Canadians actually supported the coalition, once the hysteria died down.

Yet some reporters say things like "The last time a coalition was attempted Canadians spoke out against it in such strong numbers that had an election been called Stephen Harper would have gained a huge majority."

The hysteria against the coalition largely vanished after Christmas, 2008.

On Jan. 3-7 Nanos found 33% would vote Conservative, 34% Liberal, 19% NDP.

By January 12th to 14th, 2009, the Strategic Counsel found the parties were back to more or less 2006 levels: CPC - 36%, Libs 29%, NDP 18% and it also shows the public now almost evenly split in terms of their attitude towards coalition. It appeared that the short term bump the Tories got after they prorogued had vanished. The coalition had 44% support, another election 49%, yet only 36% would vote Conservative.

On Jan. 15 - 17 EKOS found 50% support for the Coalition, while 43% would prefer the Conservative government to the Coalition, and 6% were undecided, although only 36% would vote Conservative. Yet 49% wanted a new election, showing some confusion remained.

Even after the federal budget Jan. 27, which 62% liked (on Jan. 28-29) and 67% said the opposition should support, Strategic Counsel found Conservative support had dropped to 34%. While this poll did not mention the word coalition, the attitudes against Harper had dropped even further than on Jan. 12-14. It found 51% agreed "The Harper government has failed Canada on the economy, and another government should be given a chance” while 49% disagreed; 63% agreed "Stephen Harper hasn't changed at all and this Budget is all about politics and buying time for his government" while 69% agreed "Regardless of this budget, I still blame Stephen Harper for causing an unnecessary political crisis two months ago when he should have been focusing on the economy," and 72% agreed "The Harper government would not have introduced a budget like this if it had not been for the pressure from the opposition parties."

And in late April 2011 only 17% of Liberal voters did not like the idea of a coalition with the NDP.