Corona Politics – Federal Councilor Ueli Maurer wants to shorten quarantine – News

Contributions for showmen and nurseries. State aid for public transport. Supplemental credits for corona tests. Is the crown crisis costing the federal government more and more? Comments Federal Councilor Ueli Maurer.

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Maurer has been a member of the Federal Council since January 1, 2009. The politician SVP was head of the Federal Department of Defense, Civil Protection and Sports (DDPS) until 2016. Since 2016 he is Head of the Federal Department of Finance (FDF). 2019 is the second year in office as federal president for the 68-year-old man after 2013. Maurer was president of SVP Switzerland from 1996 to 2008. From 1991 until his election to the Federal Council, he was a member of the National Council.

SRF News: When was the last time you had a sleepless night due to rising crown debt?

Ueli Maurer: That’s why I don’t have sleepless nights. You know the problems and you have to solve them. I still sleep well. Our projections also currently show that we will spend less money than was feared. Parliament has approved just over 30 billion Swiss francs. We are going to need about 18 billion of them. Then there will be less income, which will add about 22 billion more debt at the end of the year.

The economy slumped 25 percent in the spring, right now we are still around minus five percent compared to the year before. How do you assess the economic situation?

We are relatively stable, especially thanks to the pharmaceutical industry. Things are going quite well in SMEs too. The export industry, the machinery sector, is struggling. Some of them have empty order books until the middle of next year.

And in tourism, especially in urban tourism, we have had big downturns. Nothing is happening in the travel industry yet. All flight operations do not take off. Where we fight, we really fight.

The crown debts mentioned above do not yet take into account fiscal deficits in the coming years. That also costs billions again.

We expect about three billion tax losses this year. And almost the same next year. We assume we will reach roughly pre-Corona situation in 2024. That means there are still three very tough years with taxes.

But it should still be possible without tax increases. We can handle that. But we have to be very disciplined with expenses. And the situation at the moment worries me a little, because you keep putting more money into money.

In the spring you said in Parliament that there were no more black horses. They crouched over the box.

I’ll try. But, of course, the temptation is great. Parliamentarians come from their regions. You still have problems there. And the first call is for federal funds. The federal government tries to protect the population and support the economy. But none of this is unlimited. There is no zero risk at the cash register and zero risk in the healthcare sector.

The question remains: How much economic output are we willing to sacrifice for health protection? Are we heading for a second blockade?

We cannot afford a second lockdown. We don’t have money for that. That means we have to take action based on risk. This also means that you probably have to take risks in the healthcare sector.

There is currently a discussion about whether quarantine regulations still make sense if Switzerland, by its own definition, is itself a country at risk. Is the quarantine obligation still economically viable?

That worries me a lot, of course, because now people are quarantined very quickly. We urgently need more tests to determine who is really infected. We are already discussing how quickly we can get negative people back to business, to work, even if they were in a vulnerable area.

The interview was conducted by Erwin Schmid.