Galery

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Members of the Task force for Greece receive daily compensations from the state budget for the technical assistance they provide. This became clear from a document by Deputy Minister of Administrative Reform Manousos Voloudakis, who submitted a response to a parliamentary question from independent MP Nikos Nikolopoulos.

According to 2011's data, the Greek side covered the costs of foreign public officials, which included travel tickets, accommodation and daily allowances amounting to 92 euro.

The Minister stressed that "no higher allowances have been paid to foreign state officials or to any member of the Task force."

At the same time, the government was forced to withdraw once again the legislative act, according to which the basic salary of Parliament employees was expected to be cut by 25%.

The news caused a stir among the privileged "caste" of employees. They decided to go on strike to prevent the vote of the legislative act. According to their representatives, since 2009, their salaries have been reduced by 63%.

Parliamentary employees immediately stopped work and gathered outside the hall, where a meeting between the Parliament Speaker and his deputies was being held. They submitted a petition requesting that the measure be withdrawn because "our wages are the lowest in the entire public sector, while other departments have special payroll tables, their employees' income is not taxable, and they receive double one-off retirement payments."

Recording secretaries, stenographers and secretaries warned that they will not enter the plenary hall and will not allow the document to be ratified. The decision of the trade union supporting New Democracy to withdraw from party ranks was indicative of their anger.

Several hours later, yet another revolt of parliamentary officers was crowned with success. Just before the introduction of the legislative act, government sources said that it did not contain any provision that would affect them.

In practice, this is the second time the government has been forced to withdraw the measures aimed at changing labour relations of the most privileged civil servants. In November, Finance Minister Yiannis Stournaras withdrew a decree aimed at equalising these with the labour relations of others employed in the public sector.

According to sources, the decision to withdraw the second consecutive legislative act was made because of fears that parliamentary staff might prevent the vote on the bill for a new tax system.

Lawmakers from the Radical Left SYRIZA said that they supported employees. Panagiotis Lafazanis said that these measures were inconsistent with the Constitution and defined the legislative act as unacceptable.