Another Swiss town —Mendrisio in Ticino — wants to close its swimming pools to foreigners; one-third of Switzerland’s population struggles to pay bills; and other news in our Friday roundup.
Ticino town wants to close its swimming pools to Italians
Following the example set by two other Swiss towns — Porrentruy in Jura and Basel — where foreigners are kept from using their public pool, the Ticino municipality of Mendrisio also wants to implement such a restriction at peak times.
Given the overcrowding of the local beach on weekends, local politician Massimiliano Robbiani has, along with two other elected officials, filed a parliamentary motion demanding that the town’s swimming facility only be open to locals during weekends and on public holidays.
“It is not fair that those who live and pay taxes here end up not being able to find a place,” the motion states.
People from nearby Italy are particularly blamed for crowding the faciity.
One in three people struggle to pay their bills in Switzerland
Nearly a third of Swiss people are struggling to make ends meet, with the cost of rent and health insurance premiums particularly taking a toll on their finances as well as morale.
This is the finding of a study published on Thursday by the Comparis consumer platform.
The survey reveals that approximately one in three people struggle to cover all their expenses.
Nearly a quarter (24 percent) of respondents say they have to watch every penny they spend, and 6 percent can’t make ends meet at all.
Those aged 36-55 are the hardest hit: 9 percent of them say their money doesn’t stretch far enough, compared to 4 percent of those aged 18-35.
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MP seeks to limit the protection status for Ukrainian refugees
When refugees from Ukraine started arrive in Switzerland over three years ago, protection status ‘S’ — allowing them to stay in Switzerland — was quickly activated.
About 70,000 of them are currently living in Switzerland.
Now, according to a motion passed by the parliament, it could no longer be so.
“At the moment, S status is de facto a free movement of persons from Ukraine, directly into the Swiss welfare state. This is not right for our own population,” said the motion’s author, deputy Pascal Schmid from the Swiss People’s Party.
He therefore proposed that the government determines which areas of Ukraine are currently at war with Russia, and which ones are not, before granting the right to stay in Switzerland indiscriminately to each arriving refugee.
The Federal Council does not want to list the ‘safe areas’, so that Switzerland can “act flexibly.”
Nevertheless, the State Secretariat for Migration (SEM ) will “review each application for protection on a case-by-case basis and determine whether the person concerned is at risk of a concrete threat to life or limb in their area of origin. Regional differentiation is expected to result in increased review effort when examining applications for protection.”
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