What Europe’s citizens really feel about the EU

By Dana Spinant

Date: 01/06/06

European citizens feel that they are badly informed about the European Union and do not understand how it works. They believe it is influenced by business yet they still trust it more than their national governments.

These are the conclusions of an opinion poll commissioned by European Voice, the results of which were presented on 30 May, one year after voters in France rejected the EU constitution.

Of the people polled, 37% said they trusted the EU, while only 22% trusted their own government. In the new member states, which joined the Union on 1 May 2004, 49% trusted the EU while only 11% trusted their own government. The European Parliament enjoys slightly more confidence than the Commission, with the Council of Ministers ranked third. 56% said that EU membership had a positive effect on their country, but only 37% believed it had a positive effect on them personally. An overwhelming majority of those polled (82%) believed that EU institutions communicated with them poorly.

People believe that the EU should be involved in policies dealing with the environment, health, immigration and foreign affairs. That belief is less strong for competition and tax policy.

The survey asked for views on the Parliament being in both Brussels and Strasbourg - a question never posed in official EU-financed Eurobarometer surveys. 68% said that Parliament should work from only one location. Among those who want Parliament to have only one seat, 76% want that seat to be in Brussels, with 24% in favour of Strasbourg.

The survey also showed people believe the EU is strongly influenced by business - 79% responded that the business lobbies were very powerful in Brussels, against 41% who believed non-governmental organisations (NGOs) were influential. People also said that they did not trust business lobbies but they trusted NGOs.

The survey, which polled 1,000 citizens in the 25 member states in 17-21 May 2006, was carried out by Penn, Schoen and Berland, a research-based communications consulting firm based in Washington.

Mark Penn, president and founder of PSB and global CEO of Burson Marsteller, said: "The survey shows that the majority of EU citizens see themselves as pro-European but that the benefits of EU membership are not clear enough. This is a particular problem with people from the first 15 member states."

Presenting the results of the poll, Penn said the survey showed three broad areas of concern: trust, benefits of EU membership and communication.

"If the EU was a political candidate, with low levels of trust, poor awareness of its strengths and a poor communicator, I would be worried," he said.

Penn divided the EU electorate into three groups - a base of around 56% who see the benefits of EU membership to their country, an opposition, 33%, who believe the EU has a negative impact, and the swing group, 11%, who believe the EU has no effect.

"These are the people the EU needs to win over," he said.

In order to win over the swing voters, the EU needed to "open the doors to citizens, help them understand and feel part of the process of work that is being done", improve communications but also "stop talking only to the base".

The EU also had to focus on the areas that EU citizens were concerned about - such as health, environment, defence or immigration - in order to win over the 'Euro don't-knows'.

• See European Voice EU-wide Citizen Survey on home page

Article summarises the conclusions of an opinion poll commissioned by European Voice, the results of which were presented on 30 May 2006. The main findings of the survey were that European citizens felt that they were badly informed about the European Union and did not understand how it works. They believed it was influenced by business yet they still trusted it more than their national governments.

European Voice: Homepage http://www.europeanvoice.com

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