A new Financial Times/Harris Poll examines public opinion in the five largest European countries, Britain, France, Italy, Spain and Germany, on issues related to the so-called “reform treaty” that would re-shape the institutions of the European Union. The treaty, if adopted, would change voting procedures, expand the role of both the European Parliament and national legislatures, and include a charter of fundamental rights. EU leaders, meeting in Lisbon on October 18, endorsed the proposed new treaty.

This poll which was conducted just before the EU Summit finds that hardly anyone in these five European countries is very familiar with the treaty and most people are not at all familiar with it (between 54% and 68% say they are not at all familiar).

This survey also finds that majorities of adults, who are at least somewhat familiar with the treaty in all five countries, from 63 percent in France to 76 percent in Germany, want their countries to hold referendums on the treaty before it is adopted. Another key finding is that modest pluralities of those who are familiar with the treaty, but far less than majorities, believe a new reform treaty would have a positive effect in four of the countries, but that a 51 percent majority in Britain believes it would have negative effect. Britain is, and has been, far more hostile to the European Union than most other European countries, influenced permanently by the anti-European editorial policies of most British newspapers.

These are some of the results of a Financial Times/Harris Poll conducted online by Harris Interactive® among a total of over 1,000 adults in each of the five countries between October 3 and 15, 2007.

Given that so many people are not familiar with the new reform treaty it is no surprise that many people have no opinions, positive or negative about it, even after some information about the treaty was given to them. After the first question on familiarity, those interviewed were told that the new treaty “establishes a Permanent President of the European Council, appointed by national governments for a period of two and a half years. This would replace the present system where the President of the European Council rotates every six months.”

Other interesting results of this poll include:

* There is no consensus in these five countries as to which institutions in Europe have the most power - The European Parliament, the European commission, the national governments of European Union countries, or the European Court of Justice.

Very large numbers of people have no opinion on whether or not the new treaty would:

* Increase the power of the E.U.;
* Provide greater continuity;
* Create a European superstate;
* Enable the E.U. to operate more effectively.

However pluralities in most of the countries (and majorities in a couple of cases) think that on balance the new treaty is more likely than not to have all these effects.