Phonegate: Schlatter motion rejected in Switzerland

Phonegate: Schlatter motion rejected in Switzerland
By : Phonegate Team • 10 May 2025

On May 7, 2025, the Swiss National Council rejected the motion by the Deputy Marionna Schlatter calling for genuine market surveillance to monitor compliance with legal radiation limits for cell phones and protect users’ health. This decision comes at a time when the Deputy has publicly denounced the Phonegate scandal, specifically citing our NGO’s revelations on the total lack of control of actual smartphone emissions in Switzerland.

Details of the vote in the National Council

In the National Council vote on Marionna Schlatter’s motion, 62 Deputies voted in favor of the text, while 130 voted against and 8 were absent or did not vote. This decision, which is difficult to justify in view of the lack of existing controls, seems above all to protect industrial interests to the detriment of public health.

The Schlatter motion, an ignored call for telephony market surveillance

In her tweet, Marionna Schlatter recalls: “Today, the National Council rejected my motion to introduce market surveillance (monitoring compliance with cell phone radiation limits). Health protection is therefore still not guaranteed”.

The Phonegate scandal and Switzerland’s lack of control

Since 2016, the Phonegate affair has highlighted that the vast majority of phones tested in France exceeded authorized radiation thresholds, a finding that led to model withdrawals and software updates (58 smartphones, including the iPhone 12). Unlike France, Switzerland has no authority responsible for monitoring compliance with health standards for non-ionizing radiation, leaving manufacturers to self-regulate and exposing the population to uncontrolled risks.

Record profits for frequencies, zero francs for health

This policy choice is all the more cynical given that, over the 2012-2024 period alone, the Confederation cashed in on nearly 1.4 billion Swiss francs from the sale of 4G and 5G frequencies to the mobile operators Swisscom, Sunrise and Salt. By way of example, the allocation of 5G frequencies in 2019 alone brought in almost 380 million Swiss francs for the State, without any of this money being invested in protecting public health.

The Federal Council’s argument: cost, not health

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https://phonegatealert.org/en/phonegate-schlatter-motion-rejected-in-switzerland/