Swiss consumers don’t need govt help to cope with inflation -finance minister

Swiss Finance Minister Ueli Maurer attends a information conference in Vienna, Austria August 25, 2020. REUTERS/Leonhard Foeger

ZURICH, Could 25 (Reuters) – Swiss Finance Minister Ueli Maurer ruled out federal government help for individuals hit by high strength costs and claimed spending budget cuts could be wanted simply because the govt would not elevate taxes to climate a looming economic storm.

“Petrol costs are economical in wealthy Switzerland,” he told the Tages-Anzeiger paper in an job interview published on Wednesday.

Maurer, a fiscal hawk from the appropriate-wing Swiss People’s Occasion, stated a recession was nearing but its severity depended on how extended the war in Ukraine lasted and on vitality charges.

He said Swiss financial institutions ought to resist pressure to action up enforcement of sanctions on Russians becoming punished in the West for the invasion of Ukraine.

“If something we should really say: Gradual down a bit and never employ the sanctions with a ‘Swiss finish’. Our banking institutions likely sanction far more harshly than any person else,” he was quoted as saying.

He stated Switzerland need to use fuel-fired electric power crops and increase the lifetime of nuclear electrical power vegetation to assist meet its power needs, adding that Switzerland would aid to finance gasoline terminals that neighbour Germany was creating.

Reporting by Michael Shields Enhancing by Edmund Klamann

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