Sunday Morning: The 2024 Confederation accounts, announced with a deficit of 2.6 billion francs, should be better than expected, announces Swiss Finance Minister Karin Keller-Sutter in Sunday Morning.
“The one-off contribution of almost a billion that Parliament wants for the SBB will be paid in 2025 instead of last year,” explains the federal councilor. “But it is still impossible to quantify the additional income.”
The outlook, however, looks bleaker for the following years, with annual deficits of around 3 billion francs per year, she recalls. In 2026, there is already “an additional burden of around 2 billion”, due in particular to the 13e AVS pension, she notes. “The good news is that we will receive additional, unanticipated revenue from Geneva.”
The canton of Geneva will receive significantly higher revenues for the years 2022 and 2023, in particular thanks to companies active in the trading of raw materials and energy, explains the Saint-Gallois PRL. “According to initial estimates, these extraordinary revenues could bring in several hundred million per year for the next three years.”
Ms. Keller-Sutter notes, however, that these sums are “far” from being sufficient “to restore federal finances.” Expenses continue to rise, she warns. “Relief program” only reduces spending growth from 3% to 2%, she adds
The current president of the Swiss Peasants’ Union candidate to succeed Viola Amherd
NZZ on Sunday: National Councilor Markus Ritter (Center/SG) is leading a professional campaign for his candidacy to succeed Viola Amherd at the Federal Council, notes the NZZ on Sunday. The president of the Swiss Farmers’ Union (USP) has planned two major television interviews next week and has hired a renowned public relations agency.
-The USP, for its part, has already laid the groundwork for Mr. Ritter’s succession at the head of the association, declaring that national councilor Martin Hübscher (UDC/ZH) is one of its ideal candidates. “I will never let the farmers down. Transmission and succession [au sein de l’USP] must be perfectly adjusted,” says Mr. Ritter in the newspaper.
Restricting Switzerland’s access to American chips would be a self-goal, according to Guy Parmelin
NZZ on Sunday: Swiss Minister of the Economy Guy Parmelin rejects in the NZZ on Sunday the classification of Switzerland by the United States of new American President Donald Trump in a category restricting access to artificial intelligence computer chips. “This classification is difficult to understand,” he says.
The federal councilor assures that initial discussions have already taken place with the United States to change the situation, because “Switzerland produces innovations which are also relevant for the Americans”. “It would be a self-goal for the United States” to restrict Switzerland’s access to computer chips, assures the Vaudois UDC. (ATS)
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