The UDC and the PS do not want the federal budget

The prospect of the budget debates in December is already making the federal Bern boil. The SVP is calling for more money for the army and less for development aid. A solution that the PS does not want. Both parties threaten to reject the budget.

Othmar von Matt / ch media

When going to Bern on Wednesday, the farmers brought neither cows nor tractors, but a large yellow sign. A red arrow drawn upwards symbolizes the increase in federal spending between 2003 and 2024. A green arrow pointing downwards shows the reduction in the share allocated to agriculture in the total budget of the Confederation during the same period: it has declined from 7.4 to 4.7%.

The message is clear: agriculture has tightened its belt over the last 20 years. Further cuts in the field are therefore unfair.

The President of the Farmers and National Councilor of the Center Markus Ritter announced it straight away: “We will oppose all attempts to save money that concern us”. In nominal terms, spending on agriculture has remained stable for 20 years. But taking into account purchasing power, farmers lost 13%:

The objective is to save 490 million francs over the coming years, at three levels:

First success of peasant lobby

Thanks to their action, they have already recorded a first success – in terms of the financial envelope. The finance committee of the National Council wants to recommend to that of the economy (CER), competent in the matter, to maintain the level which prevailed from 2022 to 2025. Thus, there would be no loss.

The example of the farmers shows this: the Confederation is extremely slow in making substantial savings. Parliament as a whole is also responsible for this. During the fall session, he mocked spending restrictions. According to a summary of the finance administration, Parliament even increased the amounts planned by the Federal Council.

He thus increased the army’s spending ceiling by four billion for the years 2025 to 2028. This increased from 25.8 to 29.8 billion francs. Increases also took place for program agreements in the field of the environment (2025 to 2028): the commitment credit was extended by 70 million – for forestry.

In terms of encouraging training, research and innovation (2025 to 2028), the National Council and the Council of States have granted an additional 59 million. And for culture (2025 to 2028), Parliament increased the spending ceiling by two million.

Conflict of principles

To everyone’s surprise, even the Council of States reversed its own decision to save money. This summer, he wanted to increase the spending ceiling for the army by cutting international cooperation (IC). But he backtracked in the fall semester. The Upper House still wants to give more money to the army – but more at the expense of development aid.

This back and forth highlights the crux of the problem: the right wants more resources for the army due to the evolution of the international threat, but the UDC and a large part of the PLR ​​are not ready to finance this through tax increases.

They are therefore pushing to scale back, especially in development aid. This has a ceiling of 11.27 billion francs for 2025-2028.

UDC national councilor Lars Guggisberg does not beat around the bush:

He also specifies where the first party of Switzerland intends to cut:

A strategy that the Socialist Party, for its part, rejects en bloc:

Menace rejection

If it still comes to this, the socialist is considering radical decisions: “We do not rule out rejecting a failed budget in December.”

The UDC brandishes similar threats. “We leave all options open,” says Lars Guggisberg.

An unnatural alliance would then lead to an emergency budget in December. “The risk does indeed exist,” recognizes centrist national councilor Markus Ritter. “The amount we are seeking in the budget is enormous. The entire left absolutely does not want to save money. And on the right, we know from experience that we will not let economies that are too weak go to waste.”

The Greens, the PS and the UDC represent a clear majority in the National Council with 131 votes; the Center, the liberal Greens and the PLR ​​have only 69. Even without the environmentalist group (23 votes), the PS and the UDC would obtain a majority of 108 votes.

The emergency budget comes after two rejections by the chambers during the overall vote. Since 1872, this has happened seven times, and almost happened again in 2016.

Five years at once

In this situation, Parliament should debate a transitional budget for the first quarter of 2025 in December, according to the finance administration. This would be developed by the Federal Council. The debate on the “normal” budget would then resume in March 2025. There are no rules beyond this deadline.

What happened in 2023 proves that an emergency budget remains an entirely possible scenario. During the first overall vote of the National Council, the budget was adopted only extremely narrowly – by 79 yes, 75 no and 40 abstentions. Markus Ritter, then responsible for the Center, only reluctantly thinks about it:

French adaptation: Valentine Zenker