On Thursday, December 12, the Federal Court will hold a public deliberation in Mon-Repos, in order to decide the appeal filed by the Greens and socialist women to cancel the AVS 21 vote of September 2022. The Swiss people then accepted, at a very narrow majority (50.5%), the reform which provides for an increase in the retirement age of women to 65 years.
But since then, the Federal Social Insurance Office has communicated that the figures put forward during the campaign on the financial future of the AVS were too pessimistic for 2023: by 4 billion francs initially, and by 2 .5 billion after new calculations.
Did these pessimistic forecasts have an influence on the outcome of the vote? If the population had had the real figures, would the majority have swung to the no side? These are questions, among others, that judges will have to address.
The daily newspaper “Le Temps” learned of the trial, which will therefore take place in public. The court will be composed of three federal judges: Lorenz Kneubühler (president), François Chaix and Stephan Haag, as well as two substitute judges: Marie-Claire Pont Veuthey and Tanja Petrik-Haltiner. It is a mixture of magistrates from various political tendencies: from the PS, the PLR and the Vert’liberaux.
Women born in 1961 will be particularly attentive to the decision that will be made. They are the first to be affected by the gradual increase in the retirement age. From January 1, 2025, they must have worked 64 years and 3 months to receive a pension.
