The Swiss President, Guy Parmelin, announced on May 26, 2021 the end of negotiations with the European Union. This abandonment took place following the Summit in Brussels on May 23, 2021, where Mr. Parmelin and Ms. Von der Leyen, President of the European Commission, met. None of the discussions were able to bring satisfactory results to the points of disagreement.

Currently, there are 5 bilateral agreements between Switzerland and the European Union dealing with the following subjects: free movement of persons, land transport, air transport, technical barriers to trade and agriculture.

These agreements remain up to date thanks to the voluntary nature of the Swiss government, which integrates the new provisions into its law while maintaining its freedom to refuse.

The framework agreement between Switzerland and the European Union, which has been on the table since 2002, is the solution for keeping the bilateral path up to date and harmoniously applied. The agreement negotiated for 7 years between the parties provides for the quasi-systematic adoption of European law by Switzerland. This consensus would have allowed Switzerland to gain influence on the development of European law without losing its sovereignty. Indeed, it would have kept its right of refusal towards a European measure in order to add a stake for each party in case of negotiation.

This text also provided for a dispute settlement procedure in case of disagreement between Switzerland and the EU. Today, if a problem arises between the two parties, no outside entity can intervene to move the negotiations forward. The framework agreement reflected a desire to set up an arbitration tribunal composed of a Swiss judge, an EU judge and a third judge appointed by the first two. Unfortunately, if the tribunal considered that the dispute concerned European law, then it would have to decide on the basis of the case law of the European Court of Justice.-

Switzerland was cautious because such a framework agreement with the European Union would undoubtedly have led to legal changes through the adoption of EU law. But it was mainly because of profound disagreements that it was unable to sign the agreement, since the European Union and Switzerland do not have the same interpretation of the free movement of persons, which is more liberal for the Union. With this text, Switzerland should have transposed the directive on citizenship of the European Union. If so, European citizens who settle in Switzerland would have had easier access to the Swiss social system than they do today.

In these negotiations, Switzerland also wanted to protect its wages through accompanying measures. Today, if a European company wishes to send a posted worker to Switzerland, it must notify the administration eight days in advance. With the framework agreement, this period would be reduced to only four days. Switzerland considers that this period is too short to allow time for labour inspectors to check that there is no wage dumping. This change could have led to a weakening of the level of protection for workers in Switzerland.

Finally, one of the repercussions of the end of these negotiations concerns the medical technology industry. Having lost its free access to the European Union's internal market and as a result of the new European regulation on medical devices, this branch of the Swiss industry is now on the same level as third countries.

Before the announcement of the breakdown of the negotiations, an internal document of the Federal Council was revealed. It listed the political, economic and social consequences of abandoning the negotiations for each area. Other sectors would be affected, such as agriculture, food security and electricity exchange.