GREECE: Greek doctors, city police and teachers walk off the job in protest over a new bill that will reduce the public sector and fire thousands of state workers

Record ID: 341178

  • Title: GREECE: Greek doctors, city police and teachers walk off the job in protest over a new bill that will reduce the public sector and fire thousands of state workers
  • Date: 16th July 2013
  • Summary: VARIOUS OF MAN BROWSING NEWSPAPER HEADLINES AT NEWSPAPER STAND NEWSPAPERS HANGING 'ELEFTHEROTYPIA' NEWSPAPER HEADLINE READING: "They Are Cutting and Sewing Hopes and Lives" NEWSPAPERS 'TA NEA' HEADLINE READING "Last Minute Lifting to the Multi-Pronged Bill"
  • Embargoed: 31st July 2013 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Greece
  • Country: Greece
  • Topics: Domestic Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVA967V649NFAJ8X5FZSX2XQQQ9O
  • Story Text: Greek workers staged a 24-hour nationwide strike on Tuesday (July 16) in protest of the government's plans to fire thousands of public sector staff, disrupting transport and forcing hospitals to rely on emergency staff.
    Athens has long promised to reform and shrink its antiquated civil service as a condition for more bailout funds from foreign lenders, but the latest plan has sparked anger among Greeks struggling through an economy with an unemployment rate of nearly 27 percent.
    Over a week of marches in Athens by municipal workers are expected to culminate in a rally before parliament in the afternoon, with garbage collectors, bus drivers, bank employees and journalists, among various groups, joining the walkout.
    The strike was called by the private sector union GSEE and the public sector union ADEDY.
    Representing about 2.5 million workers, the two unions have brought workers to the streets repeatedly since Greece was plunged into a debt crisis in late 2009.

    "I understand that the strike is harmful, but on the other hand when there is no dialogue, when there is no discussion, when all of a sudden the Minister decides to play smart and take decisions and give orders, it is only natural to have a strike. This is not the way to make reforms. They need a plan, a design, persuasion," said 63-year-old jeweller Ilias Staikos.

    "I am unemployed, but in general I think that the workers are always right. When jobs are lost they are definitely right," said Antonis Roussos, a 28-year-old unemployed man.

    "I will not participate because I work for the private sector. The issue is that all these strikes, this uprising, takes place for the public sector, which in comparison to the private one is a privileged one. For us, who have seen our salary reduced by 50 percent after 30 years of work and we do not know if we will have a job tomorrow, no one cares," said 50 year-old Eleni who did not wish to give her last name.
    The latest strike comes ahead of a parliamentary vote expected on Wednesday (July 17) on reforms Athens agreed with its European Union and International Monetary Fund (IMF) lenders as a condition for 6.8 billion euros in aid to be released by Friday's (July 19) deadline.
    On Thursday (July 18), German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble visits Athens, which is also expected to draw protests from Greeks who blame European paymaster Germany for austerity policies that have shrunk income levels and boosted unemployment.
    Greece's lenders, which have bailed it out twice with 240 billion euros in aid, have grown impatient with the slow progress it has made in streamlining a 600,000-strong public sector widely seen as corrupt and inefficient.
    But with unemployment at an all-time high and at twice the euro zone average, many Greeks are furious at plans to put 12,500 workers into a "mobility pool" by September, giving them eight months to find work in another department or get fired.
    Some 25,000 workers will be placed in the scheme by the end of the year.
    The plan has turned into the latest headache of Prime Minister Antonis Samaras' fragile coalition government, which nearly collapsed last month over the abrupt closure of the state broadcaster ERT and the firing of its 2,600 staff before it is re-launched in a smaller form.
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