The Health Promotion Switzerland foundation celebrates its twenty-fifth anniversary in Lausanne, at its national conference. Alain Berset links prevention to “Health2020”, the strategy adopted by the Federal Council a year earlier, and to its participatory approach. He opens with a quip by Walter Matthau: his doctor had given him six months to live, but since […]
Before the political scientists gathered in congress, Alain Berset recalls that he himself studied political science before a doctorate in economics. He quotes Groucho Marx: politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong remedies. The substance concerns Old-Age Provision 2020, presented as a test for […]
Alain Berset brings together cantons, doctors’ associations, hospitals, pharmacists, insurers and patients’ organisations. The aim: a lasting solution for managing the admission of doctors, temporarily reintroduced since summer 2013. The round table sets out the principles: plan needs from a regional and cantonal perspective, with the partners; make the quality of care the central criterion; […]
Five days after the yes to the initiative “against mass immigration”, the Federal Council meets the presidents of the parties and parliamentary groups at the Von Wattenwyl House. Alain Berset presents the state of Old-Age Provision 2020, in consultation until 31 March. All the parties acknowledge the need for the reform. On the method, they […]
At the National Library, Alain Berset announces the Swiss Grand Awards for Literature: Philippe Jaccottet and Paul Nizon, and the Special Translation Award to Christoph Ferber. The Swiss Literature Awards 2014 go to Urs Allemann, David Bosc, Roland Buti, Rose-Marie Pagnard, Matteo Terzaghi, Urs Widmer and Vera Schindler-Wunderlich. He jokes about the sobriety of the […]
On behalf of the Federal Council, Alain Berset opens the campaign for the federal decree on primary medical care, put to the vote on 18 May. The President of the Swiss Conference of Cantonal Health Directors, Carlo Conti, is at his side. The diagnosis: many family doctors are retiring without a successor, the population is […]
Three weeks after 9 February, Alain Berset speaks at the Swiss Institute for International Studies, at the University of Zurich. He starts from a world without a compass: certainties “zerfallen wie modrige Pilze”, Taleb’s black swan has become so frequent that white swans look like an endangered minority. His thesis: Switzerland needs a neo-concordance, a […]
At the Equilibre theatre, Alain Berset opens the Russian Cultural Season, in the presence of the Russian Deputy Minister of Culture, Alla Manilova. It marks the bicentenary of diplomatic relations: in March 1814, Tsar Alexander I had appointed Count Jean Capo d’Istria minister plenipotentiary to the Diet. The Crimean crisis intrudes on the evening. “It […]
The French Minister of the Economy and Finance, Pierre Moscovici, is received in Bern by Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf. Before their meeting, a working lunch also brings together Johann N. Schneider-Ammann and Alain Berset. The two finance ministers adopt a joint declaration on continuing the tax dialogue between France and Switzerland, notably on inheritance and administrative assistance. […]
Switzerland is guest of honour at the Leipzig Book Fair: nearly 70 publishing houses and more than 80 writers. At the Gewandhaus, Alain Berset delivers the opening speech, one month after 9 February: multilingual Switzerland explains its singularity to its large neighbour. “Literatur ist der natürliche Feind der Schlagworte.” Later, at the Swiss reception, he […]
The Inter-Parliamentary Union holds its 130th Assembly in Geneva, in the year of its 125th anniversary. On behalf of the Federal Council, Alain Berset welcomes the delegates of the world’s parliaments, in English and in French. He opens with a remark by Churchill on what is harder than an after-dinner speech: climbing a wall leaning […]
The 17th Swiss Film Award ceremony takes place for the first time at the Schiffbau in Zurich. Sabine Boss’s “Der Goalie bin ig” wins four Quartz awards, including Best Fiction Film. Alain Berset presents the honorary award to Alexander J. Seiler, a pioneer of new Swiss cinema and director of “Siamo Italiani”. His laudatio praises […]
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