Mail in voting

Rick and I voted in the Swiss votation today, sitting on our couch in southern France. After breakfast we we will walk to the post to mail our ballots. We need postage, but in Switzerland there is no postal charge for the ballots.

Every Swiss citizen gets a ballot package in the language of their canton. My first was handed to me within minutes of taking my citizenship oath in 2006. I've voted in all but one of the four annual votations since then.

No matter what canton, the packages are identical except for language. The colors are the same. Federal voting information is in the brown booklet, cantonal in the white. There's a blue envelope to seal the white verification card and keep it separate from the white ballot. 

The booklets are information packed, including the law wanted to be rescinded, the new law  or regulation to be taken up by parliament. Pros and cons are given. That includes the government's position.There's a two-page list of all the parties and groups with their oui or non. 

 

To get more information in Switzerland there's TV and newspapers. There are the rows of posters. Proponents design posters that they put up in every community. The only variation is the language appropriate to the canton. Some are quite amusing, some boring.

Rick and I discuss the issues, read up on an issue on the internet, check a vocabulary word or two or more. We check all the party and group stances. Normally, whatever the far right UDC wants, we disagree, but we don't automatically agree with the center to center left.

The most important federal issue this time is Swiss neutrality. The second is about food and water. On the cantonal level is free contraception and a 39,500,000 CHF appropriation and modification of a housing law. 

We sign the verification slip and give our birth dates. Our names are already printed on them. We put the slip in the blue envelope. I am not worried about confidentially. 

A few times in the past we've taken the ballot package to the polls which are open only a couple of hours. Very few people vote in person. In both villages where I have voted we were offered tea, coffee, cookies and croissants. This is not done everywhere.

Rick's first vote included the volunteer poll workers taking a photo as he put his ballot in the box and welcoming him. We vote by mail most of the time even when we aren't traveling. 

One of the few times Swiss outside the country had trouble getting their ballots was during Covid which had nothing to do with the process and a lot to do with quarantines all over the world.

I am grateful to be a citizen/resident of a country where voting is encouraged and efficient.  

The results of the votation will be early evening after the polls close.