While all eyes are expected to be on the leaders of the federal parties during tonight’s debate, Google has its eyes trained on how Canadians are responding to the election so far.

A series of trends unveiled by the search giant ahead of tonight’s leader’s debate appears to show that Canadians are more focused on Conservative Leader Stephen Harper than his rivals.

The non-scientific data released Thursday reveals that in the last seven days, searches for Harper have outpaced those for Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau by 66 per cent, while Canadians searched for Harper four times more often than for NDP Leader Thomas Mulcair.

The searches spiked after the writ was dropped Sunday and since then searches for Trudeau have spiked ahead of those for Harper just once on Aug. 3.

 

 

Google also tracked where searches for the party leaders originated over a month from June 23 to July 23 to create an anecdotal map of where party leaders generated the most interest across the country in the leadup to the election.

In the GTA, the map appears to show a rough tie between searches for Trudeau and for Harper. Mulcair led in searches in just a handful of ridings in southern Ontario, none in the GTA.

Canadians concerned about jobs, housing, climate change

In its own data on the elections released Thursday, Twitter Canada found that in the two days after the election was called, the economy, the upcoming debate and security and Bill C-51 were the most buzzed about terms on the social network.

The Google data also show that searches and mentions for a number of terms related to likely campaign issues are up so far in 2015 compared to the same period last year.

When it comes to the economy, Canadians have been googling more about jobs, TFSA accounts and housing and oil prices this year.  Terms connected with the environment and energy, such as climate change, Keystone and oil spill, are also up in 2015.

The past few months have also seen more searches on government and democracy terms such as the senate, Mike Duffy’s trial, and the Supreme Court of Canada.

On the foreign front, Canadians have been more concerned this year with ISIS, the Iran nuclear deal and Bill C-51.

Harper most popular on Twitter; Most leaders don’t follow each other

Twitter also issued scorecards gauging the popularity of each of the leaders.

Stephen Harper appears to be the most followed federal party leader, with more than 852,000 followers. Justin Trudeau has 693,000, while Tom Mulcair has 144,000 and Green Party Leader Elizabeth May has 159,000. Bloc Quebecois Leader Gilles Duceppe has 85,443 followers.

Despite thousands of tweets on the site, it appears a number of the leaders are not paying a great deal of attention to what the others have to say, at least officially.

Not one of the leaders follows all of the others. Elizabeth may follows all but Gilles Duceppe, while Harper and Mulcair follow none. Of the other leaders, Trudeau only follows May.

Canadians curious about leaders

Over the past six months, it appears that curious Canadians have searched for a range of information about the federal party leaders, from Thomas Mulcair’s religion to Stephen Harper’s height.

Here are the top questions, as compiled by Google, that Canadians have searched about the leaders.

Questions Canadians searched on Justin Trudeau

  • How old is Justin Trudeau?
  • What is Justin Trudeau’s net worth?
  • What are Justin Trudeau’s accomplishments?
  • What is Justin Trudeau’s stance on C-51?
  • Who is Justin Trudeau’s mother?

Questions Canadians searched on Thomas Mulcair

  • Who is Tom Mulcair?
  • Why is Harper not attacking Mulcair?
  • Is Tom Mulcair proposing to scrap Bill C-51?
  • Is Mulcair a French name?
  • What is Thomas Mulcair’s religion?

Questions Canadians searched on Stephen Harper

  • How long has Stephen Harper been Prime Minister?
  • How tall is Stephen Harper?
  • Where was Stephen Harper born?
  • What episode of Murdoch Mysteries is Stephen Harper in?
  • When did Stephen Harper apologize for residential schools?

Canadians searched on Elizabeth May

  • Who is Elizabeth May?
  • What did Elizabeth May say?
  • Where does Elizabeth May live?
  • Is Elizabeth May in divinity school?
  • How old is Elizabeth May?

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