FT/Harris Poll in Britain Finds Immigration Tops the List of Political Issues "Most Important" to the U.K.

A recent Financial Times/Harris Poll surveyed British opinion about the possible snap election and while Prime Minister Gordon Brown decided that he would not be calling a snap election, a 41 percent to 27 percent plurality felt that he should call it. Larger proportions of Conservatives (58%) and Liberal Democrats (46%) felt he should have done so. Labour supporters were split 36 percent – 36 percent. A 55 percent majority of the British public believes Labour would have won. Only 18 percent think the Conservatives would have won.

The most surprising finding in the survey was probably that, when asked to name the one issue that was "most important to Great Britain", more people mentioned immigration (29%) than the economy (19%), crime (11%), terrorism (10%) or any other issue. However, when asked which one issue was "most important to you and your family" more people chose health (22%) and the economy (15%) than chose immigration, which was tied with crime (with 12% each).

These are some of the results of a Financial Times/Harris Poll conducted online by Harris Interactive® among a total of 1,138 adults aged 16 to 64 in Great Britain between October 3 and 15, 2007.

Other interesting findings include:

• Slightly more people identify themselves ("think of themselves") as being Labour (25%) than Conservative (22%). However, fully 25 percent do not identify with any party — the equivalent of being an "independent" in the United States;
• Conservatives (71%) are slightly more likely than Labour supporters (66%) to say they are absolutely or very certain to vote in the next election;
• More people (27%) think that Gordon Brown’s performance as Prime Minister has been better than they expected than think it is worse than they expected (8%). However most people say "in line with" their expectations (45%) or that they are not sure (20%);
• Gordon Brown enjoys a clear 31 percent to 20 percent lead over Conservative leader David Cameron as the person "who would make the best Prime Minister". But even more (32%) are not sure.
• British opinion is split almost equally between those who regard the European Union (36%) and the United States (35%) as Britain’s most important foreign relationship;
• The British government gets poor marks for its handling of the recent floods there; 52 percent think it was incompetent, while only 20 percent thought it was competent. On four other recent crises (the outbreaks of foot and mouth disease and blue tongue, terrorist attacks and the near collapse of the Northern Rock bank) opinions were more evenly divided.

TABLE 1

"Regardless of whether or how you may have voted in past elections or how you may vote in future ones, which party do you normally think of as your party?"

Base: All British adults

Note: Percentages may not add up to 100% due to rounding

"How certain will you be to vote in the next election?"

Base: All British Adults

Note: Percentages may not add up to 100% due to rounding

* = less than 0.5%

"If Gordon Brown calls a snap election, what would you have expected the outcome to be?"

Base: All British adults (before the decision not to have a snap election was made)

Note: Percentages may not add up to 100% due to rounding

* = less than 0.5%

– = no response

"Thinking about Gordon Brown’s first four months as Prime Minister, has his performance been better, worse or in line with what you expected?"

Base: All British adults

Note: Percentages may not add up to 100% due to rounding

"Irrespective of how you may vote in the next general election, who would make the best Prime Minister?"

Base: All British adults

Note: Percentages may not add up to 100% due to rounding

** = small base

"How competent or incompetent do you think the government has been in handling each of the following crises?"

Base: All British adults

Note: Percentages may not add up to 100% due to rounding

"Do you think Gordon Brown should call a snap election, or not?"

Base: All British adults (before the decision not to have a snap election was made)

Note: Percentages may not add up to 100% due to rounding

"Of the following issues, which one is most important to you and your family?"

Base: All British adults

Note: Percentages may not add up to 100% due to rounding

* = less than 0.5%

– = no response

"Of the following issues, which one is most important to Great Britain?"

Base: All British adults

Note: Percentages may not add up to 100% due to rounding

* = less than 0.5%

– = no response

"Which foreign relationship do you regard as most important for Great Britain to sustain?"

Base: All British adults

Note: Percentages may not add up to 100% due to rounding

This FT/Harris Poll was conducted online by Harris Interactive among a total of 1,138 adults aged 16-64 within Great Britain between 3 and 15 October 2007. Figures for age, sex, education, region and Internet usage were weighted where necessary to bring them into line with their actual proportions in the population. Propensity score weighting was used to adjust for respondents’ propensity to be online.

All sample surveys and polls, whether or not they use probability sampling, are subject to multiple sources of error which are most often not possible to quantify or estimate, including sampling error, coverage error, error associated with nonresponse, error associated with question wording and response options, and post-survey weighting and adjustments. Therefore, Harris Interactive avoids the words "margin of error" as they are misleading. All that can be calculated are different possible sampling errors with different probabilities for pure, unweighted, random samples with 100% response rates. These are only theoretical because no published polls come close to this ideal.

Respondents for this survey were selected from among those who have agreed to participate in Harris Interactive surveys. The data have been weighted to reflect the composition of the adult populations of the respective countries. Because the sample is based on those who agreed to participate in the Harris Interactive panel, no estimates of theoretical sampling error can be calculated.

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