{"id":58610,"date":"2026-06-14T06:26:18","date_gmt":"2026-06-14T06:26:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/?p=58610"},"modified":"2026-06-14T06:27:45","modified_gmt":"2026-06-14T06:27:45","slug":"switzerland-votes-on-plan-to-cap-population-at-10-million","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/?p=58610","title":{"rendered":"Switzerland votes on plan to cap population at 10 million"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

BBC: <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Can a country put a fixed limit on its population? That is the question Switzerland will be answering on Sunday in a referendum to decide on a proposal to cap their population at 10 million, a move that has exposed divisions about immigration in the Alpine nation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The move is backed by the right-wing Swiss People’s Party, which describes it as a “sustainability initiative” aimed at easing pressure on housing, public services and the environment. However some voters see this as the party’s latest anti-immigration move.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dubbing it a “chaos initiative”, the government, other political parties, business leaders and trade unions argue it will deprive hospitals and hotels of much needed staff, and damage hard-won relations with the European Union, leaving non-EU member Switzerland isolated in a very risky world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Switzerland’s population has grown rapidly since 2002, when it stood at 7.3 million. Now it is 9.1 million, 27% of whom are Swiss residents who were born abroad.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Switzerland’s system of direct democracy<\/a> means all major decisions are taken via the ballot box. Campaigners simply have to gather 100,000 signatures to ensure a nationwide vote.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many voters are concerned by overcrowded trains, expensive apartments and rising health costs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The latest opinion polls indicate this could be a very close vote.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They suggest voters are inching towards a no vote by a wafer thin margin, with 52% opposed – but polls remain divided, with 45% saying they are in favour of the proposal and a significant number of voters still undecided.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BBC: Can a country put a fixed limit on its population? That is the question Switzerland will be answering on Sunday in a referendum to decide on a proposal to cap their population at 10 million, a move that has exposed divisions about immigration in the Alpine nation. The move is backed by the right-wing Swiss People’s Party, which describes it as a “sustainability initiative” aimed at easing pressure on housing, public services and the environment. However some voters see this as the party’s latest anti-immigration move. Dubbing it a “chaos initiative”, the government, other political parties, business leaders and… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":58613,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-58610","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-in-english"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58610","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=58610"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58610\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":58612,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58610\/revisions\/58612"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/58613"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=58610"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=58610"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=58610"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}