Inter­pel­la­ti­on Mar­chand-Balet (18.3445): Auto­ma­ted vehic­les and lia­bi­li­ty. When will legis­la­ti­on in Switz­er­land be adapted?

Sub­mit­ted text

In the U.S., a self-dri­ving car ope­ra­ted by Uber struck and fatal­ly inju­red a fema­le pede­stri­an in March 2018. This case rai­ses que­sti­ons about lia­bi­li­ty in the event of acci­dents. Switz­er­land is posi­tio­ning its­elf as a pio­neer in the deve­lo­p­ment of auto­ma­ted dri­ving: name­ly in Sion, Fri­bourg, Zug and Gen­e­va, cor­re­spon­ding tri­als are being car­ri­ed out. The­r­e­fo­re, a quick adap­t­ati­on of the legis­la­ti­on in Switz­er­land is of key importance in order to pro­mo­te the deve­lo­p­ment of the­se tech­no­lo­gies and to con­so­li­da­te Switzerland’s posi­ti­on in this field. A moti­on to abo­lish the legal hurd­les was adopted by the Natio­nal Council.

In view of the rapid deve­lo­p­ment of auto­ma­ted dri­ving, all legal issues must be cla­ri­fi­ed as quick­ly as pos­si­ble. I the­r­e­fo­re pose the fol­lo­wing questions:

1. accor­ding to the Fede­ral Coun­cil, when will Swiss legis­la­ti­on on auto­ma­ted vehic­les be adapt­ed? Is the­re an action plan or a timetable?

2. what is the cur­rent situa­ti­on regar­ding lia­bi­li­ty in the event of accidents?

3. is the­re a poli­ti­cal will to pro­mo­te the intro­duc­tion of auto­ma­ted vehic­les in Switzerland?

4. would new legal pro­vi­si­ons be conceiva­ble that regu­la­te the que­sti­on of lia­bi­li­ty for the­se vehic­les in the test phases?

State­ment of the Fede­ral Coun­cil of 15.8.2018

1. within the frame­work of the The revi­si­on of the Road Traf­fic Act curr­ent­ly in pre­pa­ra­ti­on (SVG revi­si­on) is inten­ded to ensu­re that it is pos­si­ble to react to inter­na­tio­nal deve­lo­p­ments in con­nec­tion with auto­ma­ted vehic­les in a time­ly man­ner. The con­sul­ta­ti­on on the SVG revi­si­on is expec­ted to be ope­ned in the spring of next year.

2./4.As sta­ted in the report of the Fede­ral Coun­cil in respon­se to the postu­la­te Leu­ten­eg­ger Ober­ho­zer 14.4169 As explai­ned abo­ve, com­pul­so­ry insu­rance and owner’s lia­bi­li­ty ensu­re that inju­red par­ties are indem­ni­fi­ed by the insu­rance com­pa­ny in the event of an acci­dent. The owner’s lia­bi­li­ty also gua­ran­tees insu­rance covera­ge for pilot pro­jects (direct right of cla­im of the inju­red par­ties). The­r­e­fo­re, the­re are no legal foun­da­ti­ons spe­ci­fi­cal­ly desi­gned for this purpose.

3. yes. For exam­p­le, the reso­lu­ti­on adopted by Par­lia­ment calls for Moti­on 17.3049 “Digi­tizati­on. Paving the way for auto­ma­ted and self-dri­ving vehic­les” pro­vi­des the neces­sa­ry legal basis for making the neces­sa­ry regu­la­to­ry adjust­ments in line with tech­ni­cal deve­lo­p­ments and in step with the inter­na­tio­nal legal framework.