IRISH women believe the EU's top priority should be to tackle drug trafficking, a new survey shows. They share this concern with women in most other member states, notably Britain, Italy, Portugal and Sweden.
Women in a further seven member states cited international crime, including drugs, as the top priority for EU action.
The survey asked people in member states to list, in order of priority, their concerns for EU action. It questioned 65,000 people - half of them women - throughout the 15 member states. The poll in Ireland took in 3,000 people, in rural and urban areas.
After drug trafficking and organised crime, Irish women want action on (in order of preference) fighting AIDS and cancer, unemployment, human rights, the environment, social justice, mobility in the EU, peacekeeping and sharing research knowledge.
Of least concern to Irish women were: fear of loss of national identity, greater control of external EU borders, losing the pound to a single European currency and fear of other countries joining the Union.
The poll was conducted to get a "snapshot" of women's views about the EU in order to direct policy, according to the Austrian Minister for Women's Affairs, Dr Helga Konrad. She said Europe was still undemocratic as far as women were concerned and "will remain so if the democracy of the sexes was not recognised".
Most women expressed strong support for an European involvement in peacekeeping in international conflicts, at about 70 per cent. However, when asked about the desirability of a common European army they were less enthusiastic. Only 39 per cent of Irish women said this was a priority.
RTE and the IRTC can take heart from the survey's findings about where women get their information about the EU and world affairs. While Irish people come a respectable ninth in being informed from television news, at 73 per cent for both men and women, and rank sixth place in being informed by newspapers (52 per cent for women and 58 per cent for men), Ireland tops the EU league for being news informed by radio with women (at 74 per cent) just topping the men (at 73 per cent).