Health and cost of living top voters’ concerns

THE state of Ireland’s health services and the rising cost of living are the top European issues in the North West constituency, the latest Irish Examiner Questions and Answers poll has found.

According to the poll, conducted at the weekend by Lansdowne Market Research, 21% of voters identified the health service as an election issue while 18% said that the cost of living was of growing concern to them.

Surprisingly just one of the top ten issues identified by voters in June's European election is in any way directly related to Europe. Agricultural reform was cited by 10% of voters in the North West constituency, reflecting the rural base of the electoral area.

Otherwise voters cited issues of concern that cannot be directly influenced by MEPs, revealing the lack of knowledge on the ground as to the role voters believe their representatives can actually play in the European Parliament.

The latest findings mirror those from an earlier Irish Examiner/Prime Time European election poll in the South constituency which also identified the cost of living and the state of the health services as top issues in the European elections. In today's poll just 1% of those surveyed identified the EU Constitution and EU enlargement as European election issues, the same amount who said that they were concerned about refugees and immigration, the use of Shannon by American troops and the environment.

Housing, long believed to be a top election issue by all parties, was only identified by 7% of voters, despite numerous campaigns by several parties aimed at exploiting the issue, while 6% were concerned about drugs.

Today's poll also registered a Government satisfaction rating of 36% in the North West constituency up 6% on the South constituency figure.

Overall 53% of those polled said they were dissatisfied with the current performance of the Government, while 11% said they didn't know.