site.btaBulgarians Remain Among EU Optimists but Want their Voice to Count More - Survey

Brussels, October 18 (BTA Correspondent Nikolay Jeliazkov) - Bulgarians remain among EU optimists, shows a Parlemeter survey presented by the European Parliament on Wednesday.

The 2017 Parlemeter survey is based on face-to-face interviews with 27,881 Europeans, aged 15 or more, in all EU 28 Member States, between September 23 and October 2, 2017.

Forty-eight per cent of Bulgarians think that the EU is heading in a good direction, but only 28 per cent feel this way about their country.

When asked against which threats the EU protects them best, Bulgarian respondents cited freedom to travel, work and study - a reply shared by the majority of citizens from the UK, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Ireland, and Slovakia. The other possible answers to this question included: fundamental rights and freedoms; right to work; sufficient pensions; and environmental protection.

When asked if they see themselves more as citizens of their home country or the EU, most Bulgarians replied with "both", just like most respondents from Austria, Finland, the Czech Republic, the Netherlands, Denmark, and Lithuania.

The share of Bulgarians who feel that their voice counts in the EU is dropping, while in 23 Member States this share is increasing.

While in the last 10 years the question of solidarity within the EU has lost its importance for citizens, as evidenced by a drop of 10 per cent, nearly half of Bulgarians consider this an important matter.

In the EU-28, sixty-four per cent of respondents said the EU membership is good for their country, and 57 per cent said they are content with being part of united Europe. When asked against which threats the EU should protect them, citizens cited terrorism (58 per cent), unemployment (43 per cent), poverty and exclusion (42 per cent), and uncontrolled migration (35 per cent). Fewer than a quarter cited climate change (23 per cent), religious radicalism (23 per cent), organized crime (22 per cent), armed conflict (21 per cent), political extremism (20 per cent), the spread of infectious diseases (10 per cent), cyber-attacks, social dumping and threats to data privacy (9 per cent each).