The defunct seasonal workers scheme could be reintroduced if the rightwing Swiss People’s Party gets its way. The party says it would give more control on immigration and manpower hiring. The prospect frightens those who went through it the first time.
The proposal comes as part of the party’s initiative «against mass immigration» which comes to a nationwide vote on February 9.
«We should reintroduce the seasonal workers status for sectors like construction and agriculture, it was a very good system. Unfortunately it was weakened and then abolished by the political world,» said People’s Party president Toni Brunner in interviews with the NZZ am Sonntag and the Le Temps newspapers between the end of November 2013 and early January 2014.
«Our initiative states there is no guarantee that people can stay, bring their family or be supported by the unemployment insurance.»
The original seasonal workers scheme was started in the early 1930s, when, as its name suggests, foreigners were given leave to stay in Switzerland during the working season.
There were conditions attached to the «A Permit»: social security benefits were reduced, workers were not allowed to change employer or place of residency during their working season and family reunification was not allowed.
Needing manpower during the post-war economic boom, Switzerland issued six million of these permits between 1945 and 2002, when the scheme was abolished following the introduction of the free movement of people between Switzerland and the European Union.
At the Casa d’Italia restaurant in Biel, Luciano Turla wrinkles his nose in disgust on hearing Brunner’s comments. The 69-year-old former mason and building site foreman, now retired, came to Switzerland from the Italian province of Brescia in 1960, aged just 16. He was a seasonal worker.
Tough conditions
A «good system»? Turla doesn’t agree. Seasonal workers had practically no social security protection, he remembers.
«They hired you when they needed you, then when they didn’t, they gave you a kick up the behind and you were on your way. If you were laid off, you had to go back to Italy, where you were not entitled to unemployment benefits, or anything.»
Towards the end of the season, which in the building trade was generally early December, you could well be sent back home with just a few days’ notice if the weather stopped work. Or, when the season was supposed to start again, employers often delayed sending contracts to you for the same reason, making it impossible to come back to Switzerland.
«My first experiences as a seasonal worker were somewhat bad. The first two years, when I was working in La Neuveville [a village on Lake Biel], I just had a room in an old house. In winter it was freezing cold and in summer very humid..,» Turla said.
But, unlike many of his compatriots, Turla did not have to endure living in sheds. «For the 1963 season I was hired by a company in nearby Nidau, which had just built workers’ lodgings. It was a real luxury. There were three-person rooms, showers and a canteen.»
The boss treated everybody well in Nidau, he recalled and Turla ended up staying for 25 years. «But it wasn’t the same story with the local residents. It was the time around the Schwarzenbach initiative [which sought to stop the influx of foreigners to Switzerland] which meant all sorts of rubbish was being said,» Turla added.
«We could only go out to restaurants where there were other Italians. We pretty much couldn’t go into Swiss restaurants because you were stared out.»
Kafkaesque administration
Many seasonal workers had to deal with administrative troubles as well. «In 1965 I went back to Italy to do my military service and returned to Switzerland in April 1966, as a seasonal worker,» he explained.
«In 1968 I married an Italian girl with residency. In October we had a baby. My mother-in-law wanted me to stay for the Christmas holidays at least. I wrote to Bern and they told me I could only stay until December 23 and then I had to leave. I then had to go back to Italy so I could return in January, first as a tourist and then as a seasonal worker,» Turla said.
In 1970 Turla was granted the coveted B Permit, an annually renewable residency permit, which allowed access to social insurance and family reunification.
«From then on things became better, easier,» Turla said.
A child’s experience
For her part, Cristina Inacio Denti, of Portuguese origin, spent the first nine years of her life far away from her father. As a seasonal worker, he was not permitted to bring his family to Switzerland. «He arrived in Geneva in 1970, aged 35 and an experienced mason, even if he had to start off there a simple labourer,» she said.
«To get the B Permit you had to work four consecutive seasons [five until the beginning of the 1970s]. It was really complicated. You only had to lose a few days, even if it was because the company laid you off before the end of the season and all that you had accumulated was lost.»
«My Dad was so afraid of losing a single day that he even went to work when he was ill, which meant that one time he ended up in hospital with pneumonia.»
Illegal life
By 1982 he had managed the four consecutive seasons. «He thought it would be easy, but having a B Permit wasn’t enough. There were all sorts of other conditions, including having an adequate place to live, with a maximum of two children of the same sex per room. We were six brothers and sisters and my father had a small flat. It was already hard then in Geneva to find a flat big enough for a family,» Inacio Denti said.
So Inacio Denti and her family ended up living as illegal immigrants for more than a year. «To avoid the authorities, we had to leave the flat in the morning and stay with friends. We had to avoid drawing attention to ourselves as much as possible and play in silence. I remember that my Dad would tell us off if we made the slightest bit of noise.»
In November 1983 the family finally found a bigger flat, but it was still not quite big enough. «One of my brothers had to be declared to the authorities later on,» explained Inacio Denti.
It was a period that left its traces, says Inacio Denti, who is now 40 and a primary school teacher in Geneva. She wrote her university diploma thesis on Portuguese immigration.
«When I was younger, I always tried to be unobtrusive, to, in a certain way, be quiet. This applies to many people who underwent the same experience as I did. It shows just how much we were marked by it.»
«But I can see that my sister’s children are really starting to feel part of Swiss society. It has taken three generations.»
Inacio Denti can’t countenance a return to the seasonal workers’ programme. «If the conditions were the same as then, this would be against human and children’s rights. It would end up pushing several types of worker into a terribly precarious existence.»