Cross-country attitudes towards Europe

by YouGov in Editor's picks and Politics

03/13/2012

Email 60% Brits would 'loosen ties' with EU while 63% Italians want federalised 'United States of Europe' A recent cross-country survey conducted by YouGov Cambridge shows that Britons want a major revision of the UK's relationship with Europe; while France, Germany and Italy want more integration. The in-depth analysis of European attitudes has been prepared in the run up to a major London conference on the future of Europe on Thursday 15 March. Core findings:

Brits call for a major revision of the UKs relationship with Europe Eurozone and Britain heading in two starkly different directions - majority of people in France, Germany and Italy want more integration and even in some cases a fully federalised United States of Europe The dynamics of German public opinion threaten a break-up of the Eurozone, with significant opposition to a greater crisis-fighting role for Germany and the ECB

Brits call for a major revision of the UKs relationship with Europe

60% of Brits want a national referendum to decide on Britains relationship with the EU (versus 19% who dont) 60% want a looser relationship with the EU or to leave altogether, and to opt out of EU-wide policies enforced from Brussels (versus 27% who want continued full membership or closer union) Only 14% want more integration with Europe and a further 13% want to keep things as they are with Britain as a full EU member

A majority of Brits want national control of almost all policy-areas including crime and justice (85%), laws on trade unions/strikes (80%), immigration (79%), agriculture (74%), financial regulation (68%), rights for workers (66%) and trade links with other countries (60%).

Findings show that Deputy PM Nick Clegg is out of step with a significant majority of his own party:

Half of Lib Dem voters want a looser relationship with the EU or outright withdrawal. National versus European control shares similar support, for most major policy areas, among Lib Dem voters including immigration (70% of Lib Dems), trade links with other countries (51% of Lib Dems), rights for workers, (50% of Lib Dems), crime and justice (81% of Lib Dems), agriculture (77% of Lib Dems) and laws on trade unions and strikes (74% of Lib Dems).

Labour and Lib Dem voters unite on attitudes to regulation and economic recovery:

Majorities of both Labour (57%) and Lib Dem (66%) voters support an EU-wide tax on profits made by banks, compared with only 39% of Conservatives who support it. UK voters in general show less support for an EU-wide tax on financial trading, but the public is still divided on this issue between a plurality of Labour (35%) and Lib Dem (39%) voters who support it, versus a plurality of Conservatives (41%) who oppose it

Changes to the Eurozone

Britain and the big Eurozone economies are moving in two starkly different directions. While Brits want less integration, a significant number of people in France, Germany and Italy want more integration and even a fully federalised United States of Europe:

Europeans call for a US-style democratically elected EU President (61% of Italians support versus 15% who oppose/ 41% of Germans support versus 28% who oppose/ 46% of French support versus 23% who oppose). and a single EU military that decides when European nations go to war (55% of Italians support versus 18% who oppose/ 41% of Germans support versus 28% who oppose/ 43% of French support versus 30% who oppose). 63% of Italians, nearly 40% of French and over 1/3 of Germans support turning the EU into a fully integrated United States of Europe. Majorities of French, Germans and Italians want continued full EU membership or more Integration. (47% of French/ 62% of Germans/ 61% of Italians).

The dynamics of German public opinion could lead to a break-up of the Eurozone, with significant opposition to a greater crisis-fighting role for Germany and the ECB:

51% of Germans say the main priority for the economy should be to curb inflation with less government spending. Only 17% of Germans support the idea of Eurobonds, compared with 53% of Italians and 1/3 of French.

More than half of Germans think its wrong to spend taxpayers money to try and save the Eurozone. Where 65% of Italians and 60% of French support lower interest rates for the EU as a whole, only 40% of Germans support. Where 63% of Italians and 51% of French support making it easier for EU countries to borrow from the ECB, only 30% of Germans support.

Britains relations with the EU

Dr Joel Faulkner Rogers, Director of YouGov-Cambridge says, Public opinion in the UK calls for a major revision of Britains relationship with the EU, with significant majorities who want a looser relationship with the EU, where almost all areas of policy are controlled by London, not Brussels. These attitudes span the political divide, and challenge the current narrative advanced by the Liberal Democrat side of the coalition government, seeking to maintain current levels of integration with the EU or to expand them.

European trends for integration

Dr Joel Faulkner Rogers, Director of YouGov-Cambridge says, In other words, a majority of voters in the Eurozones big 3 want more integration and even some elements of a fully federalised United States of Europe. They also support Brussels having control of key-policy areas, and many of these voters see central EU government as the best framework for crisis-management and responding to continent-wide problems. However, it should be noted that the desire for more integration and federal union in the Eurozone has its limits. No European country has a majority of people who are willing to cede national control in three key areas of power and statecraft, namely: national budgets, crime & justice, and the basic means of national production, in agriculture and industry.

German public opinion

Dr Joel Faulkner Rogers, Director of YouGov-Cambridge says, German public opinion presents a major obstacle to alternative paths for weaker Eurozone countries between default and exit from the Eurozone or heavy austerity and likely continued stagnation inside it. A shift towards greater ECB activism would evidently require leadership from Germany as Europes largest economy and its most powerful creditor. As it currently stands, German opinion looks unlikely ever to support the expansion of backstop and bail-out roles for the European taxpayer, or the likely higher doses of European inflation that would come from policies designed to relieve the adjustmentpressure on peripheral debtors like Greece, such as greater monetary easing, allowing the ECB to become European lender-of-last-resort, a Euro-depreciation to support current-

account deficits, the collectivisation of European debt or fiscal redistribution to weaker regions. In other words, a majority of Germans say to Greece and other peripheral debtors: exit the Eurozone or enter a generation of heavy austerity. UK % 14 Germany % 40 France % 31 Italy % 44

Relationship with the EU? SURVEY COUNTRY staying as a full EU member and working for a more integrated Europe than now SURVEY COUNTRY staying as a full EU member but using the power of veto to block any moves towards a more integrated Europe than TOTAL SAME OR MORE INTEGRATION SURVEY COUNTRY having a looser arrangement with the EU, based on maintaining trade and cooperation on some common policies, but opting out of EU-wide policies enforced by a European government in Brussels SURVEY COUNTRY withdrawing from the EU altogether TOTAL LOOSER RELATIONSHIP Dont know

13

22

16

17

27

62

47

61

40

16

22

26

20 60 11

8 24 9

13 35 13

8 34 3

This poll used a nationally representative sample of British, German, French, Italian, Danish, Swedish and Norwegian adults. Total sample size was 1523 GB adults, 1553 German adults, 1518 French adults, 1506 Italian adults, 1510 Norwegian adults, 1522 Swedish adults and 1506 Danish adults.
http://yougov.co.uk/news/2012/03/13/cross-country-attitudes-towards-europe/

Will Britain vote to leave the EU?

by Peter Kellner in Commentary, Editor's picks and Politics
Mon May 21, 9:19 a.m. BST

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How would Britain vote in a referendum on the EU - and should Cameron or Miliband commit to calling one? Peter Kellner considers our latest poll results According to the Observer, senior members of Labours shadow cabinet want Ed Miliband to commit Labour at the next election to an in-out referendum on the European Union. Is that wise? YouGovs latest survey for the Sunday Times finds that only 28% of us would vote in such a referendum for Britain to stay in the EU the lowest in recent times. Fifty-one per cent would vote to leave. As Yes Ministers Sir Humphrey Appleby would doubtless put it, a commitment by a pro-European party to such a referendum sounds appallingly courageous. We need to separate out two sets of issues: what British people think of Europe today; and how they might vote in a future referendum. The first is, at best, an imperfect guide to the second. Want to receive Peter Kellner's commentaries by email? Subscribe here Here is how YouGov has recorded attitudes over the past year to an in-out referendum:
% who would vote for Britain to...

Stay in the EU (a)

June 2011 August September October December January 2012 April 35 30 33 31 41

Leave the EU (b)

48 52 47 52 41

(b) minus (a): majority for leaving

13 22 14 21 0

34

44

10

31

49

18

May

28

51

23

Two things emerge from those figures. The first is that there is some volatility, from a 23-point margin of victory for those who want Britain to leave, to level-pegging. The second is the reason for Decembers dead heat. That poll was conducted a few days after David Cameron had kept the UK out of plans for a new EU treaty on the Eurozones financial arrangements. Many people who distrust Brussels felt that if Britain could retain vital financial powers, the need for complete withdrawal had receded. But as this springs Eurozone crisis intensified, the appetite for withdrawal has revived. However, the message from the electorate in the latest Sunday Times poll is one that few politicians will find helpful. As many as 81% think it is important for Britains economy that the Eurozone solves its debt crisis. By a 60-17% margin, we want Greece to leave the Eurozone. By two-to-one, we fear that if the Eurozone collapsed altogether, this would do more harm than good to Britains economy (though almost half the public dont take sides).

'Britain has its own problems'

You might think that, with those figures, we would want Britain to help to tackle the crisis. But we dont. Only 24% of us think that an economic crisis on the Eurozone would have a major impact on Britains economy, and Britain should contribute money to help solve the debt crisis, while 57% think that Britain is not in the Eurozone and has its own problems. We should not contribute any money to solve the debt crisis. Heres the problem facing David Cameron and George Osborne. The chances are that, whether Greece (or Spain or Portugal or Italy) stays in the Eurozone or crashes out of it, an EU-wide strategy will be needed to prevent the whole of Europe, including Britain, spiralling into a deep depression. As a member of the EU, Britain will have to play its part, for this will no longer be a narrow matter of the operation of the Eurozone, but a massive challenge to the entire European Union. The International Monetary Fund may also need to get involved: an injection of IMF cash would also require a British contribution. What then? Doubtless the clamour to leave the EU would grow. But this is something that cannot be done overnight. The need would remain to respond to EU and IMF demands for billions of pounds. Were Cameron and Osborne to agree, they would stand accused of defying public opinion. UKIPs popularity could rise further. More to the point, the FEAR of a UKIP surge would surely terrify the Prime Minister and Chancellor.

Yet the alternative refusing to pay up might not be the route to popularity and electoral success. Suppose refusal means that the European rescue strategy is underpowered. Suppose the continental economies contract further. Suppose this leads to a loss of markets for UK exporters. Suppose our recession persists and unemployment rises. Will Britains voters say, the Government did the right thing. It cant be blamed for what has happened since? Or will they say: Things are getting worse. We elect governments to get these things right. This one has failed? I am sure some people will give the first response; but Id bet a fair sum in pounds, dollars or New Deutschmarks: you choose that far more will give the second. Its a useful rule for politicians to assume that voters are a fickle bunch. Success is what counts. Consistency is for the birds. So, if Cameron and Osborne think EU economic recovery requires British money, should they spend it, on the grounds that obeying voters will in fact lead to economic disaster and electoral defeat? Yes but they had better make sure their recovery strategy really will work. Theres a case for defying the public when you are sure events will vindicate your judgement. But to defy that opinion and then fail: thats a certain formula for political ruin.

Voting for the status quo?

The inconsistency of voters is something that concerns not just todays views on Europe, but the prospects for a future referendum. To assess these, lets start with a quick trip down memory lane. There have been two UK-wide referendums: one in 1975 on whether to leave the Common Market (as the EU then was), the other last year on whether to change our system for electing MPs. Nine months before both referendums, the public divided three-to-two in favour of change. But in the referendum itself, we voted both times by two-to-one for the status quo: to remain in the Common Market and to stick with first-past-the-post. Currently, we divide three-to-two in favour of leaving the EU. So, all else being equal, I would expect a real referendum to end up with a clear majority for remaining a member. Its not just a matter of crudely expecting history to repeat itself, but because I believe the main reason for the big swing towards the status quo in 1975 and last year would apply to an EU in-out contest. What happened was that, as polling day approached, the mounting fear of change trumped its hypothetical benefits. Thus, the pro-Common Market campaign warned of the costs of isolation, and the anti-AV campaign painted a lurid picture of the horrors of abandoning our traditional methods of electing MPs. Thats an all-else-being-equal analysis. But, of course, other things never are equal. Context matters. So lets imagine a referendum after the next election on whether to leave the EU. Such a vote must surely be growing likelier by the day: if Labour does promise to hold one, can the Conservatives afford not to do so, too? Here are three scenarios.

1. Ed Miliband wins the next election, calls a referendum and campaigns for staying in the EU. The Lib Dems and many business leaders campaign with him, but the Tories are divided. However, assuming that Labour is sensible enough to hold its referendum soon after the election, during the honeymoon months, hostility from parts of a defeated and divided Tory party cuts little ice. A campaign for the status quo emphasises the dangers of withdrawal from the club of our biggest trading partners. 2. Cameron wins the election and calls an early referendum in order to confirm Britains membership of the EU, remove the poison from his partys bloodstream and puncture the UKIP bubble. This time all three main party leaders as well as the business community campaign against withdrawal. As with scenario 1, their campaign stresses the dangers of leaving the club. 3. Cameron wins the election, calls an early referendum and campaigns for withdrawal. He will counter the fear arguments of the Labour and Lib Dem leaders by saying that the status quo is even more dangerous for Britains future, because the EU has become so dysfunctional.

I would expect scenarios 1 and 2 to lead to clear majorities for Britain remaining in the EU. The outcome of scenario 3 is harder to call. IF the EU is still in crisis, and IF, as a result, a significant number of British business leaders say publicly that their companies are more likely to prosper outside the EU, then the grass is greener might prove more compelling than keep a hold of nurse. For the moment I regard scenarios 1 or 2 as far more likely than scenario 3. But if scenario 3 is the one that comes to pass, it will be partly because the EU continues to fail, year after year for the next three years, to clamber out of the economic hole its in. In which case, it wont be just UK membership thats in doubt, but the future of the whole continent.