Swiss Review 6/2018

Swiss Review / November 2018 / No.6 13 Politics HEIDI GMÜR Will the Federal Council dare to take the plunge in domes- tic politics? Or will it capitulate before the finish line? Dur- ing late summer, the years of trying to find a solution to the institutional issues with the European Union (EU) came to aheadover this question. The Federal Council’s answer came at the endof September: neither nor. Itwants to continue ne- gotiations with the EU and reach an agreement as soon as possible, to guarantee the continuation of the successful bi- lateral path into the future. However, the Federal Council does not want to make any concessions in the form of ac- companyingmeasures to combat wage and social dumping, as Brussels recently demanded with the force of an ultima- tum. At least not for the time being in the face of the domes- tic political resistance that has built up over the summer. A final round of negotiations began in autumn andwas marked by uncertainty as to whether it would be possible to reach an agreement at all under the circumstances. If not, the framework agreement would ironically not fail because of the SVP’s resistance against the frowned upon “foreign judges”, but because of the resistance of the trade unions and the SP to alternative forms of wage protection accepted by the EU. In order to answer this question, we have to go back to the origins, which can be found in Switzerland. The idea of an agreement to establish a common framework for the in- creasingly complex set of bilateral accords between Bern and Brussels first emerged in the Council of States in 2002. In 2006, the Federal Council mentioned the possibility of a framework agreement in a Europe Report. Finally, in 2008 the EU made it clear that it was no longer prepared to con- tinue with bilateralism as before. It wants to ensure uni- form application of EU law by Switzerland, which enjoys privileged access to the Single Market thanks to the bilat- eral accords, even though it is neither a member of the EU nor the EEA. Brussels is particularly concerned about the dispute about individual accompanyingmeasures taken by Switzerland, which has remained unresolved for years. In the eyes of the EU these measures are not compatible with the agreement on the free movement of persons. An exam- What exactly are they talking about? A year before the elections, the desire of many politicians to get their fingers burnt by the most heated dossier in federal Bern has noticeably declined. The dossier in question is the institutional framework agree- ment between Switzerland and the European Union. While it might sound tedious, it is essentially the key to the advancement of the current bilateral path. Federal Councillor Ignazio Cassis tries to explain the com- plex framework agreement during a speech by using col- ourful blocks. Photo: Keystone