Since being back in Zürich after a winter break, I’ve noticed that the political parties have stepped up their campaigning on both sides on the upcoming Swiss-EU freedom of movement bilateral treaty referendum. I discussed the issues surrounding the vote in a prior post.

I didn’t expect the SVP, Switzerland’s resident crazy right-wing party, to go at it with such gusto, but they have. In fact, they’re making the same mistake as they made a couple of years ago with the “Sicherheit schaffen” black sheep poster, using out-and-out racism and xenophobia to attempt to sway the tide in their favour.

Here’s the poster they’ve been sticking up around the place:

© 2008 Bunch of assholes. Caption reads "Free identity cards/passports for all? No."

Nice and friendly, eh? The racism is especially barbed since the vote arose specifically because of the SVP’s rejection of the policy of extending the same privileges they currently give to other EU citizens to Bulgarians and Romanians.

On the other hand, here is the totally awesome Liberal poster (sorry the photo’s a bit crap - I was in a hurry):

Liberal Party poster for the Switzerland-EU freedom of movement agreement referendum. Caption reads "Don't destroy our bilateral route! YES to jobs! YES to the bilateral agreement"

I like the general Wile-E-Coyote vibe of it, with the dastardly and suicidal SVP nutters with hammers. The nutter on the left bears a reasonable resemblance to Christoph Blocher, SVP leader.

But what I particularly like is that it invokes just about every Swiss stereotype with glee: the mountains, the railway, fact that the train is painted red and has a huge cross on the front. That the train’s cargo is a bar of chocolate, a slice of cheese and a watch is total genius, and I just know that it was done almost without the slightest hint of irony.

Brilliant.

Christian Democrat (CVP) poster on the Freizügigkeit referendum. Photo taken by me.

On the 8th February 2009 Switzerland will vote on a referendum which will determine whether the state continues or re-negotiates its freedom of movement agreement with the European Union, of which it is not currently a member.

I point out the latter, rather obvious fact of its non-membership because in the past year, the relationship between the EU and Switzerland has progressed from something best described as blissful ignorance punctuated by the occasional bust-up, to more of a on-and-off relationship with equally common instances of shouting matches and group-hugging.

Switzerland has now agreed to cooperate with the EU (partly thanks to various scandals involving smuggling diamonds in toothpaste, corrupt principality banks, and common-or-garden tax evasion [PDF link]) in reform of its corporate tax system, which is currently home to thousands of Briefkastenfirmen (letterbox firms) who legally reside in Switzerland for tax purposes.

It also currently implementing the final parts of the Schengen open-borders agreement: something quite important given that it is, save from Leichtenstein, geographically surrounded on all sides by the Schengen zone. And out of character too: Switzerland is the first non-EU state to join Schengen.

The 8th February referendum is particularly interesting because of the unity that the EU is showing against the position of some parts of the Swiss government. It was brought about by the youth wing of the SVP, (the Swiss People’s Party yes, that SVP), somewhat against the relatively better judgement of older members. And its purpose is very clearly to deny to Bulgarians and Romanians the same freedoms that Switzerland grants to members of the EU-25, including Schengen open borders.

The Commission has so far held relatively firm against the idea that Switzerland should be allowed to discriminate, knowing that Berne has a lot more to lose in the cessation of freedom of movement than the EU has to lose from Switzerland’s digging itself into a hole. This is one EU dispute where the intransigence isn’t caused by internal disagreements. The Commission has indicated that should the Swiss referendum return a ‘no’, Switzerland would be thrown out of Schengen.

Switzerland is highly dependent on EU markets and labour. Out of a population of just under seven million, a full million live in Switzerland under freedom of movement agreements - originally conducted under a combination of various bilateral agreements and EFTA, and from 2007 onwards with the EU itself under the freedom of movement treaty.

So everybody with any sense knows that ending the freedom of movement agreement is a non-option. The economy wouldn’t quite implode, but a situation in which about a quarter of your labour force is suddenly placed into legal limbo, and nobody knows what the hell is supposed to happen when crossing the border, cannot be good. At the same time, few expect voters to actually cease the agreement. The referendum is seen, presumably, by its proponents as a bargaining chip aimed at re-negotiation.

The trouble is, Switzerland is in a very poor bargaining position. The agreement is already in place, for one thing. For another, it isn’t a member state, and Bulgaria and Romania are.  It seems that the two eastern states enjoy so much support on this issue that they haven’t had to kick up a stink about it yet, but they can and will if things look dire by late January.

And therein lies the problem: the vote could go either way. All the sensible parties are reminding Swiss people off all the Siemens and Alstom trains, BMW and Opel cars, IKEA kitchens and fine French wines that roll across the border into Switzerland every year, and of the world’s largest consumer market, to which Swiss firms get nearly unrestricted access. The SVP are currently too busy associating with Holocaust deniers to show a coherent front. Their website says they’re “against the expansion of the freedom of movement agreement“, which is a nice euphemism for “we want to re-write something we agreed to a few years ago to allow us to discriminate”. I wonder if their hearts are really in it. But then I remember what they can do, and what support they have. And that’s a bit scary.

The results for the canton of Zürich will be posted here. I wait with bated breath, and the slight sense of satisfaction that my own state is not the only complete crackpot when it comes to European integration

Amid the apoco-credit-crunchy-bailout-deflation-recession-meltdowncrisispanic, it’s easy to forget little, reliable old Switzerland. Someone might want to look into this.

Anyone?

Eh… anyone? Please?

Oh yeah. and FIX IT!

Three weeks ago today I moved to Zürich, or “downtown Switzerland” as the tourism bureau ads insist on calling it.

My previous visit to Switzerland was to the picture-postcard village of Lauterbrunnen in the Berner Oberland, a mid-summer holiday five years ago with a friend and his family. In Zürich I’ve seen another side to it. Most of these observations will be bleedin’ obvious to anyone who has been to the city, but never mind…

The typical things you expect of Swiss cities are absolutely true. Order and conservatism are clearly an integral part of life in Zürich. The public transport is superb, dense and easy to use. The chocolate is delicious and the mulled wine and roasted nuts are readily available from street vendors. Dozens of ‘private banks’ (the ones where the bankers come to visit you), emblazoned with chandeliers, stern receptionists and smoked-out windows, inhabit the lower third of the Bahnhofstrasse. Shops selling fur ply their trade with abandon. And yes, there are cuckoo clocks in the shops.

However, a few things have surprised me. The extent of the confederal system is one thing: it’s very rare to see any TV adverts, notices or announcements from the government in Berne. Rather, the canton of Zürich seems to have Amts (departments/bureaux) for a whole lot of things that in Scotland and the UK we might consider central government services. About the only thing the central government seems to advertise is military call-ups and exercises.

The prominence of Switzerland’s famous direct democracy is also quite remarkable. A couple of days ago, the people of the canton voted to outlaw smoking in workplaces (yay!). The turnout was low - 37% - but impressive given the phenomenon of ‘voter fatigue’ and other things they warn you about when talking about direct democracy in political science classes. The marketing for the vote was interesting too: the ‘against’ campaign attempted to portray the measure, which is fast becoming a pretty standard piece of legislation across Europe, as incredibly radical, and therefore dangerous. It gave me pause for thought on how socially conservative this state still is.

Another thing that seems slightly unusual, and perhaps impressive, to me is the extent of local media coverage of the city. There’s a TV channel called Züri-TV which broadcasts most of the day, and only covers stories from the city of Zürich. I was in New York City last month, and I can safely say that NY1 is far more parochial and embarrassing than Züri-TV, despite being the local channel for a city sixteen to twenty times as big. Still, the media here retain a hilarious degree of chocolate-box Swissness. By that I mean that train delays (what?!), people in Lederhosen, archery competitions for young boys, and yodelling folk singers are BIG news, even in the self-described ‘kleinste Metropole der Welt’.

Oh, and talking of the trains - they don’t always run on time. But with punctuality a matter of national pride, this circumstance is not taken lightly. When it happens I keep imagining the poor railway signaller who caused the delay getting bawled at in Schwiizerdütsch. Which is not a pretty sound, believe me.

Over and out.