French Civil Service

Amid an attempt to ease the tension between coalition partner PASOK and Administrative Reform Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, the government agreed on Friday to step up efforts to ensure that the vast majority of 6,500 sackings it needs to make in the civil service come from public servants who have committed offenses or who have illegally been put on permanent contracts.

The government has no intention of backing down over its commitment to firing civil servants this year and aims to complete their work evaluation despite objections from their union, ADEDY, Administrative Reform Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis insisted on Tuesday.

The Finance and Administrative Reform ministries have launched legal action against the ADEDY civil servants’ union over a strike it has called for Wednesday in protest at the public sector evaluation process.

The ministries want the courts to deem the action illegal and to prevent ADEDY from holding strikes for the same reason.

A new evaluation system for civil servants will be adopted from next year, government sources told Kathimerini Friday, although the Administrative Reform Ministry rejected concerns about the current scheme.

The ministry reacted after the National Center for Public Administration and Local Government (EKDDA) questioned the effectiveness of the current system.

A total of 524 public servants have been dismissed from the civil service since the beginning of 2013 after being found guilty of a wide range of offenses, chiefly disciplinary misdeeds such as fraud and violation of duty, but also crimes including attempted manslaughter and trading in child pornography, according to official data released on Wednesday.

Administrative Reform Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, who is overseeing a troika-imposed overhaul of the civil service, on Thursday issued a circular to all ministries and state bodies calling for an intensification of checks aimed at weeding out public sector employees who were hired on the basis of forged degree certificates or other fake qualifications.