BERN, SWITZERLAND – Swiss hotels could be exempt from paying value-added tax in 2012-13 to help them fight business lost because of the high Swiss franc, if a lower house committee vote is duplicated in the upper house.
The finance and economy commission voted 13-12 Tuesday 10 January to make one exception to its refusal to review measures to help fight the over-valued franc, in agreeing to give the hotel industry a year’s grace starting in April 2012.
Moritz Leuenberger sooner-than-anticipated departure will allow parliament to vote at once for two new cabinet ministers
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch.com) – Swiss Federal Councillor Moritz Leuenberger (above right), current Minister of Transport, Communications, Energy and Environment, is bringing forward his departure date from the Federal Council, from December to October, to allow parliament to vote for two new ministers at once.
The announcement came in on 9 August just days after Federal Councillor Hans-Rudolf Merz, Minister of Finance (above left), announced he would leave his post in October.
Leuenberger, 63, a Socialist Party member, had originally announced that he would step down in December. The Minister had wanted to stay until the end of the year to see the completion of the digging of the Gotthard Tunnel and to attend the next UN climate change conference in Mexico. The exact date of departure will be announced next week during a cabinet meeting.
The cabinet elections by parliament will take place 22 September.
New guidelines work with existing laws such as Lex Koller rules limiting foreign ownership
Aminona's existing towers likely to see 15 more as part of new luxury resort project
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch.com) – Tighter control over second homes in resorts must be part of sustainable development for tourist areas in order to retain their attractiveness, the federal government said Tuesday 6 July.
Bern has issued new guidelines for cantons, suggesting that these should serve as the basis for cantons’ own, revised guidelines.
The guidelines call for:
- limiting the number of second homes
- encouraging the hotel industry
- ensuring that first homes are available at reasonable prices
- improve the rate of occupation for “cold bed” homes, which outnumber regularly occupied ones for second homes.
The guidelines work alongside existing laws, but Parliament is considering a tougher law, to counteract a citizens’ initiative that calls for a vote on banning new second homes. Projects that are already underway, such as the new Aminona luxury complex to be built by Russian developer Mirax, will be not affected by the new guidelines, Martin Vinzens of the Swiss Office for Territorial Development told GenevaLunch.
The CHF500 million Aminona project in the commune of Mollens, canton Valais, of which CHF25m has been invested by the company to date, calls for three phases. The first, to build 10 towers, was opposed by four environmental groups, WWF, d’Helvetia Nostra (Franz Weber), Patrimoine Suisse and the Fondation suisse pour la protection du paysage. The ban prompted by their opposition has been lifted by the cantonal council. Phases 2 and 3, to build 45 chalets and then another 5 towers, lag behind in the approval process.
Links to other sites (Fre): Le Nouvelliste, Mollens commune, Sixieme Dimension, Swiss Federal Justice Office regulations on Swiss property purchase by foreigners
Swiss parliament in session Photo®Swiss parliament
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The upper house of the Swiss parliament has said no to a popular referendum on the Swiss-US treaty covering 4,450 UBS bank accounts. A house commission voted 8-3 Wednesday morning 16 June against a motion to support the lower house’s option for a popular vote, and the commission’s minority agreed not to take the motion to the full upper house.
The option of a referendum now returns to the lower house, which is expected to vote on it Wednesday afternoon. If it votes yes, the measure must go to a reconciliation commission of the two houses.
Update 16:35 Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - The upper house of the Swiss parliament Thursday voted 31-11 in favour of the agreement between the US and Switzerland that will allow the Swiss to provide judicial assistance for 4,450 UBS bank account holders. The vote moves the treaty a step closer to approval: the lower house votes Monday. A yes vote faces a tougher time there.
The upper house (Conseil des Etats) vote is retroactive and applies to the specific cases where requests have been made. It does not apply to future requests, which would require legislative changes. The upper house also voted against putting the treaty to a popular vote and it refused to debate the government’s plans to put in place regulations for “too big to fail” banks.
Background, GenevaLunch
Links to other sites (Fre): Le Temps, RSR, Tribune de Geneve
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - The finance commission of the Swiss Parliament’s lower house agreed Thursday 21 January to set up a special investigative commission to review decisions made by Swiss authorities concerning UBS. The new commission will review decisions made by the Swiss Federal Council, the Swiss National Bank and Finma, the financial system supervisory body, in three areas: the UBS bailout in the contect of the financial markets crisis, changes to supervisory regulations covering UBS and the decision by Finma for UBS to release client data to US tax authorities.
Didier Burkhalter, Neuchatel, new Swiss cabinet member
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Didier Burkhalter, 49, a Radical party (centre-right) politician from Neuchatel, was elected by the Swiss parliament to the country’s seven-member Federal Council (cabinet) with 129 votes against 106 for the other candidate, Urs Schwaller, PDC (also centre), on the fourth round of voting. He succeeds Pascal Couchepin, from canton Valais, who is retiring 1 November. Burkhalter’s election means his party will retain its seat on the council and the balance remains unchanged in the power-sharing Swiss government. The language balance remains intact as well, with one French-speaking canton representative replaced by another.
Details: Swissinfo and on radio, WRS. Swiss French media: Le Temps, Tribune de Geneve/24 Heures, TSR
Background story, GenevaLunch
Bern, Switzerland (Le Temps, Fre) – The effectiveness of day-fines, a system put in place in 2007 to replace short prison sentences with fines, will be debated by the lower house of Parliament Wednesday 3 June and the upper house a week later.
The system was approved by voters in 2002 and became part of the penal code in 2007, but numerous critics have said making criminals pay is not dissuasive. Suspended day-fines have come in for particularly heavy criticism.
The fines are based on a sliding scale that is linked to the severity of a crime.
Bern, Switzerland (TSR/ats, Fre) – Switzerland’s upper house of Parliament 25 May voted 27-12 to restrict marriage in Switzerland to people who are in the country legally. The lower house had earlier approved the measure, which will now become law.
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - The judicial affairs commission of the upper house of the Swiss parliament is recommending that Switzerland adopt legal measures to end what are popularly seen to be abusive pay practices by some companies. The commission, in a bid for greater transparency, is calling for companies to publish the salaries of senior managers and board members. It also wants to see the abolishment of golden parachutes, large sums paid when an executive leaves.
Update 14:30 Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Tuesday noon four countries joined the “gray” list of those willing to abide by OECD standards to exchange information on tax evasion and fraud, but who have not yet implemented the change: Costa Rica, Malaysia, Philippines and Uruguay. Switzerland was also named to this list 2 April.
Bern, Switzerland (TSR, Fre) – The upper house of Parliament and lower finally agreed late Monday on a financial package to help UBS, with “stabilize” as the key word.
Bern, Switzerland (TSR, Fre) – Christoph Blocher, former federal councilor, could be elected to the cabinet again if his right-wing UDC party’s discussions with parties of the centre go well, UDC leader Toni Brunner says.
Bern, Switzerland (Le Temps, Fre) – The freeze on new offices for doctors will be maintained following a vote by the lower house of Parliament Wednesday, which agreed to continue it until the end of 2009. The upper house earlier voted to continue it to 2010, so the proposal will now be returned there to settle the date.
The freeze, in effect for some years, is designed to avoid uncontrolled growth in the number of private practices, which parliament and health authorities believe would result in a sharp increase in health costs. A solution developed with insurance companies has been under discussion for months but no agreement has been reached, and Parliament is extending the moratorium to allow time for a solution to be found.
Bern, Switzerland (TSR, Fre) – Switzerland now must wait until Thursday morning for Eveline Widmer Schlumpf to announce whether or not she will accept her election to the post of federal councillor. According to TSR she has asked for time until then to reflect on her decision. The government now has six of its seven councillors, but the UDC has for some time threatened to pull out its two councillors if both were not re-elected. Christoph Blocher was not and it is unclear if Samuel Schmid will refuse to take his seat, which would leave Switzerland without a government.
- 11:25, Doris Leuthard re-elected comfortably. The centre-right politician’s election completes the round of voting, but the candidates must still accept their elections before the cabinet’s composition is confirmed.
- 11:10, Hans-Rudolf Merz, a center-right Radical party member, was elected the sixth Council member.
- Ed. note, 11:05, virtually all French news web sites in Switzerland are
down at the moment due to an overload of visitors. This much is clear:
the Swiss are following the election. See also: Le Temps, results and analysis - 10:45. Christoph Blocher, UDC, has been defeated during a second round of voting, a major victory for the center and left, with Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf elected in his place. She is a UDC party member from Grisons, but as yet has not accepted the election. A motion from the UDC president to halt proceedings until later today to allow time for reflection was roundly defeated. Her election could bring to three the number of women on the seven-member council if Doris Leuthard, whose seat is the last one up for election, is also elected.
- 10:15. Four of the seven members of the Swiss government have been re-elected: Micheline Calmy-Rey, Samuel Schmid, Moritz Leuenberger and Pascal Couchepin. The other three seats are still being debated, with the Socialist party removing its candidate, Luc Recordon, but refusing to support Christoph Blocher’s re-election.
