Ticino hunting president wants to profit at others' expense

The Ticino hunting president wants to profit at others' expense. His demands serve the hobby hunters, not wildlife protection.

Editorial team Wild beim Wild — 15 September 2022

Companies should be able to return to basic supply.

This is the demand of the Swiss Trade Association (SGV), which Fabio Regazzi also heads. The trade sector has evidently had enough of the free market.

The demand was underscored by quotes that numerous companies are currently receiving due to the energy crisis. Ticino hunting president Fabio Regazzi (60) is also set to pay more for electricity next year at his roller shutter company, something he strongly opposes.

As a politician I have to say: you cannot preach markets in good times and despise them in bad times.
National Councillor and finance politician Alois Gmür (67)

«The companies have profited from lower prices for years«, said the Centre Party National Councillor. There must be other ways to tackle high prices, he told Blick.ch.

Once again, this reveals the double standards and patterns of the hunting president.

The Centre Party National Councillor has repeatedly attracted negative attention in the past, including on animal welfare issues. He fiercely opposed the Locarnese National Park and sought to make the cruel barbed hooks in fishing socially acceptable again. During his term in parliament from 2015 to 2019, he also voted predominantly against the environment — as did other hobby hunters in parliament.

In 2019, the Ticino Director of the Environment and Transport, Claudio Zali, removed the ptarmigan from the list of huntable species. Hobby hunter Fabio Regazzi, however, believed he had a legitimate right before the Federal Court to kill a species in difficulty for sport. The appeal filed with the Federal Court against this government decision — to introduce a moratorium to protect the ptarmigan.

Claudio Zali features in the article in the Ticino media landscape, concluding that cooperation with Fabio Regazzi is only acceptable as long as it is a one-way street in his favor.

Once free, always free

Until now, the principle has been: «Once free, always free». Companies that have once opted for the free market can no longer return to the basic supply. Because the decision to benefit from the free market also comes with the risk of having to accept a higher price at some point — and that is currently the case.

For context: since 2009, companies consuming more than 100 megawatt-hours of electricity per year have been able to exit the basic supply and source their electricity on the free market. For years, they were able to benefit from cheaper electricity, while private households were forced to purchase electricity from their local provider at a higher price.

The Association of Swiss Electricity Companies (VSE) is not enthusiastic about the trade sector's demands. The costs of this additional procurement would be factored into the basic supply tariff. This means that existing customers in the basic supply would then have to foot the bill and bear these additional costs.

From the VSE's perspective, a return of companies would therefore be “unfair” for captive customers — precisely because the companies that switched to the free market did so for cost reasons and paid significantly less for electricity than private households for many years, as Blick.ch reports.