The Civic Democrats are the economic promoters in Switzerland. But an analysis of the votes shows who is putting most brakes on business.
Logically, the most business-friendly parliamentarians in Switzerland come from the SVP and the FDP. But who is actually putting the brakes on business-friendly legislative projects in the country?
This question was investigated by Politools on behalf of the Swiss Trade Association (sgv). The analysis was based on the votes on business-friendly bills in the National Council (NR) and the Council of States (SR).
Small time difference
According to the results, Daniel Ruch (FDP/VD) is the most SME-friendly member of the National Council with a rating of 60.1.
He is followed in second place by Benjamin Fischer (SVP/ZH; 59.6), Peter Schilliger (FDP/LU; 59.2) in third place and Thomas Hurter (SVP/SH; 56.8) in fourth place.
It should be noted, however, that Daniel Ruch and Benjamin Fischer moved up relatively late in the legislative term.
If one considers only those NR members who participated in more than 80 percent of the votes, Peter Schilliger would be in first place and Thomas Hurter in second place, it said.
GLP far behind
Among the first 50 NR members of the SME rating are 41 SVP members and 9 members of the FDP Liberals.
Of the other larger parties, the first members of the center with Fabio Regazzi (TI) and Elisabeth Schneider-Schneiter (BL) follow in 85th and 86th place respectively.
Even Farmers’ Union President Markus Ritter (center/SG) comes in at just 96th place according to the evaluation.
The Lega representative (Lorenzo Quadri/TI) was ranked 64th, the EDU representative Andreas Gafner (BE) ended up in 75th place.
From the overall list, which muula.ch took a close look at, it can be seen that the first GLP representative, Céline Weber (VD), was in 103rd place and the first EPP member came in 129th (Niklaus-Samuel Gugger/ZH).
Greens down the end
Among the traditional left-wing parties, Gerhard Andrey (Greens/FR) and Nadine Masshardt (SP/BE) still voted the most SME-friendly in 132nd and 133rd place respectively.
At the very bottom of the table are Girod Bastien (Greens/ZH), Mahaim Raphaël (Greens/VD) and Imboden Natalie (Greens/BE). These are the absolute enemies of SMEs in the NR.
SVP president as pioneer
SVP President Marco Chiesa (TI) proves to be the most SME-friendly member of the Council of States with a rating of 59.6.
He is followed by Hansjörg Knecht (SVP/AG, 58.1) in second place, Werner Salzmann (SVP/BE; 56.3) in third place and Jakob Stark (SVP/TG; 54.7) in fourth place.
Among the first 15 SR members of the SME rating are 7 members of the FDP-Liberals, 6 members of the SVP as well as one party-less (Thomas Minder/SH) and one member of the center (Daniel Fässler/AI).
Left-green camp missing
In addition to Fässler, Andrea Gmür-Schönenberger (LU) and Othmar Reichmuth (SZ) from the center party are among the top 20.
The traditional left-green camp is not represented among the 30 most business-friendly SR members. But the overall list also shows that the first SP representative, non-elected Federal Councillor Eva Herzog (BS), is in 34th place.
The first representative of the Greens follows with Mathias Zopfi (GL) on position 35.
459 votes as basis
According to the list, the most industry-UNfriendly members of the Council of States are Vera Céline in 44th place (Greens/NE), Mazzone Lia (Greens/GE) in 45th place and Zanetti Roberto in final place 46 (SP/SO).
The basis for the selection of the NR and SR votes were the bills listed in the documentation prepared by the sgv before each session.
In this way, 459 votes relevant to SMEs were identified for the National Council and 207 votes for the Council of States, which are included in the SME rating overall.
13.01.2023/kut./ena.