While half of Europe is figuring out how to attract more people, Switzerland voted on 14 June on something that looks bizarre at first - a constitutional cap on its population at 10 million by 2050. The proposal did not come from some fringe group, but from the country's largest right-wing party, the SVP.

The backers' arguments are familiar from across Europe: too much immigration, pressure on public services, a shortage of housing. But the government, parliament, employers and unions were all against it. The warning is concrete and costly: the cap could force Switzerland to tear up its free-movement agreement with the EU and thereby jeopardise access to the single European market. And all of this just three months after the country signed a deeper economic integration deal with the Union.

What is interesting is that even some of the SVP's own leaders admitted the proposal is more of a "wake-up call" than serious policy - a way to push the government into doing something about immigration, not a genuine intent to scrap free movement. In other words, a referendum as a message, not as law. The polls were split: earlier it looked like the proposal could pass, while the latest readings showed the mood turning against it.

For the Balkans, whose people have filled the Swiss economy for decades - from construction sites to hospitals - this is news with a bitter taste. The country that also lives off our hands is now voting on whether to shut the door on us. And here is the irony worth saying out loud: the very people afraid of "too many people" rarely ask who builds their buildings, who cleans their streets and who cares for their elderly. Switzerland can count up to ten million all it likes - but the economy, unlike the referendum, does not lie about who needs those hands.