Challenge for Yes side is to keep the argument to the facts, writes Stephen Collins, Political Editor
The fact that almost two-thirds of voters don't know if they will be supporting the Yes or No sides in the referendum on the Lisbon Treaty means that the contest is wide open and there to be won by whichever side mounts the best campaign.
While the Yesside has improved its position since the last Irish Times/TNS mrbi poll back in October of 2007, that is mainly due to the slippage in the No campaign and the increase in the Don't Knows.
By comparison with the first poll on the issue in March 2005, when the treaty was billed as the EU constitution, the number of people committed to voting Yes has dropped by a full 20 per cent, while the number on the No side has remained relatively static.
One surprising thing about the campaign to date is that the No side has slipped over the past three months even though it has been faster out of the traps with a campaign. Different groups on the right and left have attracted considerable publicity for themselves as No campaigners.
By contrast the Government campaign has yet to get into gear. So far it has relied heavily on the Minister of State for European Affairs, Dick Roche, who has put in a sterling performance in an effort both to educate people about the treaty provisions and to persuade them to vote Yes.
Even though the Government has yet to fix a date for the referendum, there has been a fair degree of media coverage of the campaign, yet the number of Don't Knows has increased and the number who say they are dissatisfied with their level of knowledge is a whopping 68 per cent.
One intriguing feature of the poll is that among the minority who are satisfied they know about the treaty, the proportion intending to vote Yes is 68 per cent, while among this same group the proportion intending to vote No is 22 per cent.
The fact that those who believe themselves to be better informed are much more decisively for the treaty than those who are not, should be a source of comfort to the Yes campaign. It could mean that if the issues are fully debated and people are properly informed, the Yes vote will rise.
On the other hand the fact is that by far the biggest segment of voters is in the Don't Know category and may well be open to influence by the No campaign. There are certainly fertile grounds there for the No campaign to work on.
The challenge for the Yes campaign is to persuade people to listen carefully to the arguments and keep the argument to the facts, rather than allowing the debate to be dominated by unsubstantiated assertions and scare tactics.
On the political front, it is interesting that Green voters appear to have had no difficulty buying into the Yes campaign, despite the fact that their own party was to the fore in every previous referendum with exactly the same kind of arguments that the No side is bringing forward this time around.
This time around the only political party on the No side is Sinn Féin, and the party's voters certainly share the views of the leadership, going by the results of the poll.
One potentially serious weakness on the Yes side is the apparent reluctance of Fine Gael voters to endorse the Yes side as strongly as they have on previous occasions. Fine Gael is probably the most pro-EU party in the Dáil and the leadership is committed to a Yes vote.
The fact that Fine Gael lost yet another election last year may have influenced its supporters to take the attitude that it is Fianna Fáil's responsibility to carry this referendum and that it has nothing much to do with them.
That attitude could ultimately do serious damage to the Yes campaign, particularly if the Taoiseach's standing continues to decline and becomes an issue in the campaign.
Another worrying feature of the poll for the Yes side is the fact that women are decidedly less enthusiastic about the treaty than men.
It appears they have been influenced by the argument that the EU has some kind of aggressive military agenda and it is something that would need to be clarified.
The basic message of the poll is that the better off and more politically educated voters are more inclined to the Yes side. However, a lot of work still needs to be done to convince them to vote and even more needs to be done to persuade the people in the Don't Know category to take a positive interest in the treaty.