Taoiseach (head of government) Brian Cowen Saturday 3 October announced the overwhelmingly positive response of Ireland in its referendum on the Lisbon Treaty, with a 67 percent “yes” vote and a voter turnout of 58 percent. The second referendum is a turnabout: 54 percent of voters said no to the treaty in a first referendum in June 2008.
Voting Sunday 27 September
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Swiss voters go to the polls Sunday 27 September to decide on a proposed increase in the value-added tax (VAT) to finance the country’s deeply indebted federal disability insurance scheme. They must also decide on whether to strike down a constitutional right that they approved six years ago.
The first measure is a temporary increase in Switzerland’s VAT, or sales tax, from 7.6 to eight percent. The additional funds will go to finance Switzerland’s disability insurance (AI), which is CHF13 billion in debt – and increasing by CHF4m per day. Currently, the government is dipping into the country’s old age pension (AVS) reserves to finance AI operations.
The VAT increase is scheduled to be limited to seven years, from 2011-2017. This will give the government time, it says, to clean up the AI, plagued by poor management and abuses, and put it on a surer footing for the future. A major consequence of a “yes” vote is that the country’s two big social insurance schemes, AVS and AI, will be separated. If the vote fails, the AVS, and with it the country’s pensioners, runs the risk of slipping into the red in 12 years.
United Auto Workers (UAW) members voted overwhelmingly in favour of a deal that commits Fiat to sharing key technology with the US company and to manufacture a small car in the US. The agreement was essential in order for US government loans to the company to continue. Globe & Mail, Canada
Lausanne, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Vaud’s police are calling for a unified force that would put an end to a practice common in Switzerland, where the cantonal police and municipal police are separate. Voters are likely to be asked to take a stance on the issue in September, reports TSR.
Swiss forest
Appenzell, Switzerland (Independent, UK and International Herald Tribune)- The popularity of hiking in the buff has caught on in the canton of Appenzell, if you believe international media, but not necessarily with support from the local population. Swiss and foreign hikers alike continue to take advantage of the fact that no law currently exists forbidding being naked in public, says the New York Times, whose story, also a feature in the International Herald Tribune, ran around the web like wildfire 17 March. Not so, according to a January report in Britain’s The Independent, which warns wannabe nude hikers that they now risk a CHF200 fine.
