George Katrougalos

Greek Minister of Labour George Katrougalos made a shocking admission during a speech in the city of Kalamata, Peloponnese, likening the measures the Greek government had accepted to implement to a ‘concentrated and distilled form of neoliberalism adopted during the past in Pinochet’s Chile’!

Labour Minister George Katrougalos’s plan to reform the social security system will mainly fall on the shoulders of low pensioners. 80 percent of the total €2.2bln measures needed for the period 2016-19 will derive from cuts in pensions and scrapping benefits for pensioners in the low bracket.

While the Greek government is preparing to hastily push the harshest austerity measures through parliament, reporters’ unions are proceeding with incomprehensible strike actions for nearly 6 days, till Wednesday April 27, in protest to the social security and taxation draft proposed by the government, essentially gagging the media.

Against all predictions the Greek government and its creditors have unexpectedly come very close to sealing a deal. Greek Finance Minister Euclid Tsakalotos and Economy Minister Giorgos Stathakis implied that the two sides had virtually agreed on all the thorny issues, while they were exiting Hilton Hotel where the meeting with the Quartet took place, Thursday.

While Greek pensioners and workers will be facing harsh cuts to their meagre incomes in the new taxation and social security bill, Greek Minister for Labour George Katrougalos has exempted members of the Greek Parliament, as well as Mayors and Prefects who were elected before 2012! Katrougalos admitted he had included the amendment in the new bill speaking to ANT-1 TV, Wednesday.

The Greek Finance Minister Euclid Tsakalotos is held a press conference explaining the Greek government’s moves regarding its negotiations with the country’s creditors. Alongside the Minister were also the Minister for Economy, George Stathakis and Labour Minister George Katrougalos.

Greece’s creditors might be in Athens to resume talks with the Greek side on reaching a deal about the review of the country’s adjustment program, but so far the Monday’s rendezvous has been pushed back twice. The Greek side released a new announcement informing the press that the meeting, scheduled to start at 4 pm Monday would be postponed until 2 hours later at 6.

The meeting between Greece’s creditors (Quartet) and the country’s Labour Minister George Katrougalos is in progress in Athens, Thursday, in an effort to reach a deal on matters of reforms in the social security system.

Despite hopes that Greece and its creditors could have reached a deal before the departure of the Quartet, the lenders are leaving Athens without an agreement in their baggages. No timetable for the return of the technical teams of the lenders to Athens to resume talks has been set.

No substantial progress has been made between the Greek Labour Ministry and the country’s lenders, the ‘Quartet’ who are in discussion over ways to save money so that the cash strapped country can get the ‘green light’ over the progress of the implementation of the fiscal adjustment program it agreed upon with the EU institutions the past summer.