OVER TO OUR MAN AT THE POLLING BOOTH...

Surprise, surprise, yez are all impeccably against sin. That Hot Press readers are anti-authoritarian, tilt to the left, distrust the Catholic Church and demand a more sexually tolerant and diverse society is hardly astonishing. After all, we never thought Nora Bennis and her friends were secretly buying up all our copies to keep us all gainfully employed.

Even so, there’s some interesting material in our poll’s headline conclusions. Despite the Jeremiahs, the European Union gets fulsome support by a margin of 78% for 11% against, a Euro-enthusiasts’ endorsement that may be more due to cultural than economic factors.

Interestingly, the courts get a battering. Hitherto, we haven’t seen any other opinion polls that inquired about the level of public confidence in our legal process but our sample is highly sceptical. Our verdict was a dead heat at 38% for the related propositions that Irish courts were worthy or not worthy of respect. Part of our poll happened while the Whelehan crisis was breaking but we also have to wonder whether the Beef Tribunal was a factor in this lack of confidence.

And yet if you distrust the courts, the Gardai received cautious support. 29% registered either a low degree (22%) or no confidence (7%) in their conduct while 28% had total (3%) or high confidence (25%). As for the rest, 42% voted “some confidence”.

Few loved politicians as a group. Only 18% thought them honest as against 63% who believed them dishonest. And when it came to the three most popular politicians, the top two, John Hume and Mary Robinson are above and beyond the daily political Leinster House battles while we’d also have to concede that Michael D. Higgins’ elevation to third place must have been affected by his long tenure as a Hot Press columnist. In the minor placings, Gerry Adams at 4th benefitted from a strong Ulster vote while a significant straw in the wind may be Bertie Ahern’s 7th position, attained before there was even talk of Drumcondra’s favourite Bass-drinker becoming Fianna Fáil leader.

Not surprisingly, Ian Paisley was your favourite hate figure with Albert Reynolds a close second. Obviously the former Fianna Fáil leader earned no peace dividend for himself : in 16th position, only 1% considered him their favourite politico. Meanwhile Gerry Adams featured in 5th position among your hate figures.

As ever, there were some curious anomalies. Homosexuals weren’t only far more favourable towards Irish courts with 45% against 26% pronouncing them worthy of their respect; they also showed a most becoming tolerance for our politicians with the same 45/26 ratio in support of their honesty. In both polls, they were the category most out of line with the general consensus. And for what it’s worth, gays and bisexuals also had a slightly higher degree of confidence in the Gardai than any other category of our readers polled.

Then there were your views on the Northern Troubles. In a multi-choice question, we asked to decide what was “the biggest stumbling block to a peaceful settlement?”

Not unpredictably, 42% chose Unionist politicians and 24% the British government while both the Nationalist politicians (7%) – presumably, the John Hume factor at work here – and the Irish government (6%) escaped lightly.

However Loyalist (18%) and Republican (17%) paramilitaries – the latter presumably overlapping with Sinn Féin – were equally regarded with suspicion. Even here, there was one somewhat surprising finding since 22% thought organised religion the major obstacle.

As to whether Sinn Féin should be admitted to political discussions, 47% thought they should be included now against 25% who preferred they be kept out till the I.R.A. relinquished its weapons. Another 16% thought after “3 months if the ceasefire holds.”

But only a minority – 21% in the next 2 years, 12% in the next 5 years – stated they would like to see a United Ireland in the near future. If only 9% said “never”, for 42%, it was a far vaguer aspiration. For that latter group, a United Ireland was only “sometime in the future.” Also buried among the small print was the more traditionalist view of those Under 18: 33% of them, by far the highest category, hoped to see Ireland united within 2 years.

Not surprisingly, the sample wasn’t impressed by the government’s efforts to tackle unemployment . While 21% agreed with the statement that it “is doing as much as it can”, an overwhelming 73% believed it “isn’t doing enough”.

But this didn’t translate into equally overwhelming support for social welfare recipients. If 37% believed benefits should be increased, 42% thought they should be “more rigorously controlled and monitored” while 15% concurred with the statement that benefits should be “given only to those who work on community projects.” The 19 to 29 age group were the least sympathetic to unfettered increases.

There was also a conservative minority responding to our questions on corporal punishment. If 67% disagreed that it should be “reinstated as a punishment for law-breaking”, 28% favoured it. Likewise, there was a minority favouring censorship of books, videos and films. 4% thought it “completely acceptable” and 23% considered it “necessary” as against 33% for “unnecessary” and 39% for “completely unacceptable”.

Were those who favoured some censorship affected by the video nasties scares? Certainly women (37%) in the two categories favoured more censorship than men (23%).

And what were our respondents’ attitudes to sex and drugs if not rock’n’roll? Again there was a minority (29%) that supported the continuing criminalisation of all drugs. However 55% believed cannabis should be legalised while 12% thought all drugs should be legalised. Again one group, the Under 18s, were significantly out of line with the rest of the sample. 44% supported full criminalisation.

Our panel would vote overwhelmingly for divorce. Only 4% thought it should remain illegal while 64% believed it should be fully legal now. 32% endorsed a middleground view that divorce should “be made legal in certain circumstances only”.

There remains some hesitancy about abortion with 46% accepting the catch-all proposition that it should “be made legal in certain circumstances only”. Of those who had definitively decided on this most divisive matter, 34% thought it should be fully legal while 18% thought it should remain illegal.

Moving beyond that agenda, the survey also asked questions about prostitution and the rights of gay and lesbian couples. 66% favoured the legalisation of prostitution while 30% opposed it.

(A sidebar to this issue. We also inquired if our panel had paid for sex and 9% said “yes”. Since only 1% of women responded positively, that meant 12% of men surveyed had accepted sexual services. 23% of those in the 30-39 age group paid for sex.)

As for gay and lesbian couples, 77% of those polled agreed they should be legally married (against 13%), while 54% against 30% supported their right to adopt children.