After 24 hours of debate, senators backed much of the new bilateral package—but toughened the rules on referendums and immigration.
After roughly 24 hours of debate, Switzerland’s Council of States has finished its first examination of most of the country’s sprawling new package of agreements with the European Union. Its verdict was broadly favourable, but with some distinctly Swiss amendments.
Switzerland’s relationship with the EU has long been built on bilateral deals rather than membership. Swiss voters rejected joining the European Economic Area in 1992, and over the following decades Bern and Brussels assembled a patchwork of agreements covering areas such as free movement, trade and transport. That system became increasingly cumbersome as EU law evolved, prompting Brussels to demand a more coherent framework for updating agreements, settling disputes and policing state aid. An earlier institutional framework agreement collapsed in 2021 after Switzerland walked away from the talks.
The current package is the result of a renewed effort to stabilise access to the EU single market while addressing Swiss concerns over wages, immigration and sovereignty.
Nothing is settled yet. The package, known as Bilaterals III, must still pass through the National Council, the larger chamber of parliament, where debate is expected during the winter session. The electricity agreement, one of the package’s most important components, was not part of this week’s deliberations. State Council members are due to begin considering it in December.
Stricter referendum
The most politically consequential decision concerned the eventual referendum. The Council of States wants the package to be subject to a mandatory referendum, meaning that it would need both a majority of voters and a majority of Switzerland’s cantons to pass. State councillors backed both a provision to that effect in the legislation and a separate constitutional amendment. The Federal Council had favoured an optional referendum, which would require only a nationwide majority.
On wage protection, by contrast, the upper house largely stuck to the compromise negotiated with the EU and supported by the Federal Council and the social partners. The existing requirement for foreign firms posting workers to Switzerland to provide a security deposit would disappear. Such a deposit could instead be demanded from a firm that had already failed to meet its obligations. State Councillors also backed an accompanying measure intended to strengthen protection against dismissal.
The chamber also approved CHF 3.3bn ($4.1bn) in commitment credits linked to Switzerland’s future contribution to European cohesion. If the package takes effect, payments would be made between 2030 and 2036. Of the total, CHF 2bn would go towards reducing economic and social disparities, CHF 273.4m towards migration-related projects and roughly CHF 1bn would take the form of an additional one-off commitment.
Tougher rules on immigration
Immigration produced some of the sharpest departures from the government’s position. Under the negotiated safeguard clause, Switzerland could take protective measures if immigration from the EU caused “serious economic or social problems”. The Council of States backed the possibility of an immigration levy as one such instrument. The Federal Council would use specified thresholds in deciding whether the conditions for invoking the safeguard had been met.
The upper house also tightened the rules governing EU migrants. They decided that people arriving from the EU should have to provide information from their criminal record as part of the admission process. More controversially, they voted to restrict access to the new permanent-residence status foreseen under the partial adoption of the EU’s Citizens’ Rights Directive. EU nationals who are unemployed or receiving social assistance would be barred from applying; their five-year qualifying period would start again. The Federal Council argued during the debate that a blanket exclusion of welfare recipients would be incompatible with the agreement on the free movement of people.
Another part of the package concerns state aid. The Council of States completed work on legislation establishing a Swiss body to monitor government subsidies and other forms of state support. The purpose is to prevent state aid from distorting competition in areas covered by the bilateral agreements. In land transport and electricity, the federal government, cantons and municipalities would have to report new aid above specified thresholds unless an exemption applied. Within the EU, comparable oversight is exercised by the European Commission.
The chamber also approved Switzerland’s domestic implementation of the modernised land-transport agreement. The broader package is intended to stabilise Switzerland’s access to parts of the EU single market while creating mechanisms for updating the bilateral accords as EU law changes. Negotiations were substantively concluded in December 2024 and the agreements were signed in March 2026.
Two new areas of co-operation also cleared the upper house. A food-safety agreement would create a common food-safety area, designed in part to make it easier to detect contaminated or adulterated food. A health agreement would give Switzerland access to EU health-security mechanisms and strengthen co-operation with the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control, particularly during cross-border health emergencies such as pandemics.
The next battle will be in the National Council. Its deliberations are expected in the winter session and may be still longer than those in the upper house. A nationwide vote before Switzerland’s federal elections in autumn 2027 remains possible, though the parliamentary timetable would have to move quickly.
The electricity agreement will meanwhile follow on a separate track. The relevant Council of States committee has yet to complete its work, so senators are not expected to begin debating it until December. Only after both chambers have worked through the package—and resolved their differences—will the shape of the deal to be put before Swiss voters become clear.
More on this:
Parlament article (in German)
For more stories like this on Switzerland follow us on Facebook and X.
