Housing has overtaken immigration as the issue that is most noticed by voters when asked about the Government’s performance, according to the latest monthly Snapshot poll by Ipsos for The Irish Times.
A fifth of voters (20 per cent) nominate housing when they are asked what they have noticed about what the Government has done recently. A large majority of these voters (81 per cent) have a negative view of the Coalition’sperformance on the issue.
There has been a sharp decline in the number of respondents citing immigration as the number one issue – it falls from 26 per cent last month to 16 per cent today.
Housing and immigration have dominated the monthly poll since the beginning of this year. This month, they again swap places. Immigration has been in first place for the last two months; housing in second.
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Other issues that people are noticing include climate change/sustainability on 5 per cent; and cost of living/inflation, also on 5 per cent.
After that, healthcare, budget/spending, taxes, social policies, employment, crime, democracy/political process and the recent change of leadership in the Government are each cited by 3 per cent of respondents. Education is mentioned by 2 per cent and the Palestine/Israel conflict by the same percentage.
Most voters report a negative impression of what the Government is doing. On housing, 81 per cent who noticed this had a negative view; on immigration, it was 83 per cent and on cost of living/inflation 91 per cent. Only on climate change/sustainability is the picture somewhat different – 39 per cent of respondents who cite this as the main issue they are noticing have a positive impression, while 58 per cent are negative.
Although the drop in the numbers citing immigration since last month is a sign that voters believe the Government is making progress on the issue, the recurring strength of the findings on housing will be a continuing concern for the Coalition – and suggests it will be a key issue in the general election when it comes, with the Government’s record a likely source of criticism.
In the 13 months that the survey has been run by Ipsos, housing has been the number one issue on eight occasions. In each of those months, voters have reported an overwhelmingly negative view of the Government’s efforts on the issue.
The survey does not investigate what people regard as the most important issue; rather it seeks to establish what people are noticing about what the Government is doing, and whether they have a positive or negative view of that.
The survey asks more than 1,000 respondents the following question: “What have you come across in what the Government has said or done recently that has made you think the country is going in the right or wrong direction?”
Their responses are then collated and sorted by issue and whether they view the Government in a positive or negative light as a result. A selection of their verbatim responses can be read in Monday’s Irish Times.
Methodology
Snapshot is our monthly attention poll designed to track which Government messages are cutting through.
The question we ask is simple: what have you come across in what the Government has said or done recently that has made you think the country is going in the right or wrong direction?
This question is asked of 1,000 citizens each month. The data was collected using Omnipoll, Ipsos’s telephone omnibus survey which interviews a fresh, nationally representative sample of 1,000 adults aged 15-plus every two weeks.
The sample used is RDD (random digit dialling) and includes both mobile and landline phone numbers. At analysis stage, the data is weighted in line with the known profile of the population according to the latest Central Statistics Office estimates.
Note that the results presented here exclude those who said “don’t know/nothing/no opinion” to the question.
Fieldwork for the July wave of Snapshot was conducted between July 1st and 14th.
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