National Council against nationwide introduction of mandatory rental forms
Published: Tuesday, Dec 12th 2023, 13:01
Retour au fil d'actualité
In the event of a change of tenant, there will be no Swiss-wide obligation to introduce a form to notify the initial rent in future. The National Council has rejected a corresponding parliamentary initiative from the Green Party.
On Tuesday, the Grand Chamber rejected the initiative by former National Councillor Natalie Imboden (Greens/BE) - by 116 votes to 71 with 4 abstentions. A bourgeois majority from the SVP, FDP and center prevailed. The parliamentary initiative is now dead.
Michael Töngi (Greens/LU) argued unsuccessfully that the rental form requirement would improve transparency in the rental sector. Today, prices are often increased when tenants change - resulting in a "far too high return". By systematically disclosing the amount of the previous tenant's or landlord's rent, tenants would be able to defend themselves more easily against abusive rents.
Philipp Matthias Bregy (center/VS) stated on behalf of the winning majority of the commission that the cantons are already free to introduce a form for the initial interest of the pre-renting party for their canton. Regulating the question of forms at federal level would contradict the idea of federalism.
"All in all, the proposal creates more bureaucracy," says Bregy. Tenants already have legal instruments at their disposal to challenge the initial rent. He also pointed out that even in the cantons with mandatory forms, there had been no fall in rents or increased transparency.
©Keystone/SDA
French 
English 
German 
Spanish 
Arabic