Federal Council’s education savings plans put to the test in the National Council
Published: Wednesday, May 29th 2024, 04:50
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How much should education, research and innovation cost in Switzerland? This question will be discussed by the National Council on Wednesday (today). The reason for this is a dispatch from the Federal Council on the promotion of these areas in the years 2025 to 2028.
The Federal Council intends to provide CHF 29.2 billion for this funding. This is CHF 1.3 billion more than in the 2021 to 2024 funding period. According to the Federal Council, expenditure will increase by 1.6%.
In March, however, the Federal Council also announced that it had reduced the amount originally planned by CHF 0.5 billion. In view of the tight federal finances, savings had to be made. This drew criticism from numerous stakeholders in the education and research sector.
The National Council has now received numerous amendments, in particular from the Committee for Science, Education and Culture (WBK-N), which is responsible for this area. It wants to increase spending growth to 1.7 percent. More savings should not be made in education.
For example, the Federal Institutes of Technology are to receive more money. However, more money is also to flow into vocational training and research promotion institutions.
The committee is also proposing to increase tuition fees for foreign students at the two Swiss Federal Institutes of Technology. In future, these should be at least three times as high as those for Swiss students. At present, they may be no more than three times as high
If the National Council takes up the matter, detailed deliberations will follow. The discussion of the bill, which consists of sixteen decrees, is likely to take hours.
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