Kyriakos Mitsotakis – Artifex.News https://artifexnews.net Stay Connected. Stay Informed. Sat, 07 Sep 2024 21:52:48 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.6.2 https://artifexnews.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/cropped-Artifex-Round-32x32.png Kyriakos Mitsotakis – Artifex.News https://artifexnews.net 32 32 Greek PM pledges pension, wage hikes by 2027, within budget limits https://artifexnews.net/article68617577-ece/ Sat, 07 Sep 2024 21:52:48 +0000 https://artifexnews.net/article68617577-ece/ Read More “Greek PM pledges pension, wage hikes by 2027, within budget limits” »

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Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis promised on Saturday (September 7, 2024) to increase pensions, cut taxes and social security contributions, and increase the minimum wage in 2025, as thousands rallied to protest a high cost of living.

In his annual economic policy speech at the Thessaloniki trade fair in northern Greece, he said Greece will create more jobs, increase pensions by up to 2.5% in 2025 and will raise the monthly minimum wage from 830 euros ($920) to 950 euros gradually by 2027. He added that social security contributions would be cut by 1 point.

Greece is still recovering from a debt crisis that wiped out nearly a fourth of its economic output in 2009-2018, due to austerity measures that included repeated wage and pension cuts.

But over recent years it has been achieving strong economic growth, which is seen at 2.5% this year.

Mr. Mitsotakis said Greece has changed, with strong economic growth that should be distributed in a balanced way, and be reflected in pensions and wages.

He also promised to maintain fiscal prudence in line with European Union rules.

“I don’t have with me today a bag with unreasonable handouts but only suggestions for useful and effective choices,” said the leader of the centre-right New Democracy party, which came to power in 2019 and won a second term last year.

Outside the venue, thousands of people rallied chanting slogans and holding banners reading “No to wages of starvation!” and “We can live differently”.

A special levy on the self-employed will be scrapped next year, while 243 million euros, a revenue from a windfall tax on energy companies, will be distributed to vulnerable citizens in December, he said.

A lingering cost of living crisis after the COVID-19 pandemic, the impact of devastating wildfires and floods, along with certain reforms, have put off some core voters of New Democracy, which has seen a drop in popularity according to opinion polls.

Greece will also spend 1.6 billion euros in 2025 to boost its defence, Mitsotakis said. And to help halt a tumbling birthrate, he pledged to extend a housing plan and support young parents with benefits and tax exemptions.

Mr. Mitsotakis also promised to boost civil protections, support farmers who have been hit by climate change, and reduce a property tax for home owners who insure their home against natural disasters, among other measures.

According to sources, the government plans to spend 3 billion euros in 2025 alone, amounting to about 1.5% of GDP.

Mr. Mitsotakis is expected to hold a press conference on Sunday (September 8, 2024).\



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Greek PM Vows For “Restart” After Criticism Over Handling Of Fires, Floods https://artifexnews.net/facing-ire-over-poor-handling-of-fires-floods-greece-pm-kyriakos-mitsotakis-vows-for-a-restart-4397820/ Sun, 17 Sep 2023 09:19:34 +0000 https://artifexnews.net/facing-ire-over-poor-handling-of-fires-floods-greece-pm-kyriakos-mitsotakis-vows-for-a-restart-4397820/ Read More “Greek PM Vows For “Restart” After Criticism Over Handling Of Fires, Floods” »

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The floods devastated the fertile Thessaly plain in central Greece in early September

Athens:

Faced with criticism for his alleged poor handling of the fires and floods that struck Greece this summer, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis pledged fresh funding and reforms in order to fight the “climate war”. The promises could reinvigorate the image of his newly elected government that has been tarnished by footage of residents taking refuge on their roofs in desperate need of rescue as rising waters engulfed poorly prepared regions. 

“Greece is facing a war in a time of peace,” Mitsotakis said in his Thessaloniki International Fair keynote speech on Saturday. 

“Over a two-week period, we experienced the worst wildfire and the worst floods in our history,” he added.

“The climate crisis is here and forces us to see everything differently,” he said.

The floods devastated the fertile Thessaly plain in central Greece in early September.

The storms killed 17 people, swallowed cotton crops and fruit trees and killed hundreds of thousands of animals on Greece’s breadbasket.

They devastated a country that had just been hit by “the biggest fire ever recorded in the EU”, according to a European Commission spokesman, in the northeast region of Evros bordering Turkey. 

Twenty-eight people were killed in the fires, among them two firefighting pilots and 20 migrants in the Evros region. 

The deadly blaze followed violent flames that ravaged the tourist islands of Rhodes and Corfu in July, with thousands of evacuations ordered. 

Mitsotakis also pledged a 10 percent rebate on property tax for anyone who insures their home against natural disasters, adding he is considering making such insurance compulsory. 

The Sunday daily Protothema saw these announcements as “a restart” for the government. 

The conservative leader admitted a certain “confusion of responsibilities” between the state services responsible for responding to torrential rains, as well as “the frequent tendency” to shift blame to others.  

“In Thessaly and Evros, I have heard the anger of the people,” said the prime minister, whose New Democracy (ND) party won an absolute majority in the June parliamentary elections. 

He has come under sharp criticism from the opposition and residents affected by the floods.

The government was blasted for the slowness of the emergency services and the lack of preparedness, despite the fact that Thessaly was already hit by extreme weather in 2020. 

Fingers were pointed at failures in cooperation between the army and civil protection in the hours following the disaster.

In just three months in office, Mitsotakis has seen two of his ministers resign, including one in charge of citizen protection, because he was on holiday on an island in the Aegean Sea while fires raged. 

The press has been buzzing with rumours of a cabinet reshuffle following local elections on 8 October, although the government spokesman has denied any such plans. 

The Minister for Civil Protection and Climate Crisis, Vassilis Kikilias, is also in the hot seat, according to analysts and the media. 

The Mitsotakis government bears “enormous responsibility” for the destruction caused by the extreme weather, denounced Effie Achtsioglou, former labour minister and candidate for the presidency of the left-wing Syriza party. 

She condemned the fact that “no serious flood prevention work has been carried out”. 

According to a poll for the private television channel Mega, 61 percent of those questioned have a negative image of the government and 66 percent believe that the country is heading in the wrong direction. 

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

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