2020 Swiss referendums

[2] The affordable housing initiative – to require 10% of new flats to be owned by housing cooperatives and abolish government subsidies for renovating luxury flats – was put forward by the national alliance of tenants' association and supported by left-leaning parties, and was approved after 106,000 signatures were submitted.

[7][8] Three referendums were initially scheduled for 17 May 2020 but were rescheduled (by a decision of the Federal Council of 18 March 2020) for 27 September 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

[12] The referendum, which was sponsored by the Swiss People's Party (SVP),[13] requires that the government terminate the agreement within one year of passage.

The 2014 Swiss immigration initiative passed with a narrow majority of 50.33%; however protracted negotiations with the EU resulted in a 2016 compromise agreement that the SVP criticized as weak.

The SVP has argued that the free movement hurts older Swiss workers, who would lose their jobs to young immigrants from the EU.

The benefits would flow to those that pay the federal direct tax, which would include approximately 60% of families, primarily with taxable income above 100,000 CHF;[19] the Social Democratic Party opposed the changes, charging that they would benefit wealthier families and sought the refendum to block the implementation.

[18] The think tank Avenir Suisse estimated that the increase in the child allowance, if passed, would cost 370 million CHF in lost revenue.

[18] The hunting law referendum asked voters whether legal changes making it easier to kill wolves should be blocked.

[25] Viola Amherd, the head of the Defence Department, supported the purchase because the existing F-5s are more than 40 years old and fly only in good weather and the useful life of the F-18 will end in 2030.

[26] The opponents have branded the purchase as wasteful and argued that air police services could be conducted with lower-cost light fighters.

In 2019, the Parliament passed a law giving fathers two weeks of leave at 80% of gross income after the birth of a child.