Hunt for civil servants to be moved underway
City and town halls will be closed from Monday in protest at the government’s plans to remove municipal employees from their posts as part of a bundle of reforms that are needed for the next troika bailout and which will be voted on in Parliament on Wednesday.
New Democracy MPs are also due to meet on Monday to discuss the reforms, with the targeting of local authority workers being of particular concern.
The agreement with the troika foresees the government placing this month 4,250 public sector workers in a mobility scheme, where they will receive 75 percent of their pay for nine months until they are moved or dismissed. Another 8,250 must enter the scheme by the end of September, when the troika will conduct its next program review in Greece. After that, 12,500 more civil servants have to be placed in the scheme as the overall target is for 25,000 by the end of 2013.
The first transfers will involve school janitors, teachers and ministry employees. By September, they will be joined by municipal police officers and other local authority workers.
However, Administrative Reform Ministry sources said that this would still leave the government about 3,000 people short of its September target so officials are examining other sectors from which employees can be moved.
