New Canadian Rules for Accountable Opinion Polling

Canadian insight body the MRIA has tightened its Member Code of Conduct for those members and their firms who release results into the public domain. All such firms are included but a key driver and focus for the changes is opinion polling during elections.

The MRIA (Marketing Research and Intelligence Association) represents all aspects of the market intelligence and survey research industry and boasts more than 1,800 individuals and companies as members. The revisions to its code encourage 'more consistent and rigorous transparency for results released by members on any subject matter at any time', and a new page on the association's web site will feature compliant member firms who regularly release results.

The new requirements reflect recommendations made in a report by the UK's British House of Lords Select Committee on Political Polling and Digital Media earlier this year, which address news media and digital media leaders as well as pollsters. Firms alleged to have broken the Code face sanctions from a warning to termination of MRIA membership.

MRIA Chair Mark Wood comments: 'Members who issue polls must be accountable in their transparency while the media and public require a better route to scrutiny of those firms not just during the writ period but all the time... Some discrepancies in output and predictions may still occur because of different methodologies, interpretation or voter volatility but the Report recommends other measures for peer collaboration to publicly answer this if and when it happens. It also draws a roadmap to address mutual areas of interest and responsibility between polling and media leaders and we will actively explore those in the months ahead'.

The move is supported by broadcast news industry association RTDNA Canada, whose President Ian Koenigfest comments: 'This is a strong first step to reducing the misreporting and misrepresentation of polls and a positive attempt for polling companies and the media to collaborate on the dissemination of verified data'.

The reports and company listing can be found at www.mria-arim.ca/polling .