The first Sunday review after the announcement of the elections on May 21 was made by the Prime Minister with his post on Facebook.

In it he states:

“Good morning! This is the first Sunday review since the 5/21 election date was announced. The fact that the elections are slowly approaching does not mean that our work has stopped, and this week I have a lot to tell you!

And I will start with our commitment to affordable and quality housing for young people. From tomorrow Monday, young people and young couples from 25 to 39 years of age will be able to apply to banks for an interest-free or low-interest loan to buy their own home. Thanks to the state subsidy the cost of servicing the loan will be lower than the rent they would pay. The loan for those with three children and many children (but also those who become three children and then many children during the repayment of their loan) will be completely interest-free. While for the rest of the beneficiaries it will be just ¼ of the commercial interest rate.

The beneficiaries of the specific part of the “My Home” program will be approximately 10,000. The program as a whole has a budget of 500 million and can even be doubled if the initial amount is used up. Next steps: the “Coverage” program for the housing of vulnerable young people in private homes with rent paid by the State for 3 years (the first contract with the Municipality of Galatsi has already been signed), the social compensation and the renovation programs of private homes.

It is true that Greece, for many years, was an inhospitable country for its young people, and did not give them the opportunities they should. The solution of this problem is one of our main goals for the next four years if the citizens trust us again.
We want to make the lives of citizens, especially young people, much easier and more creative, so that they feel again that the State is by their side.

And since the first step towards a creative, a better life is education, I want to tell you a news that filled me with optimism. Applications for model and experimental schools this year were more than 20,000, up from last year by about 2,200! We have invested in model and experimental schools, doubling them in 3 years from 62 to 120 (it was one of our main pre-election commitments) and the response of citizens is the best proof that this institution is increasingly accepted. These numbers testify to the great interest of families in acquiring strong educational resources for their children.

I will stay in Education but we will now move up a notch to talk about the beginning of the “Industrial PhD” program. It is a program that aims to create links between academia and business/industry, which will have many benefits for all. To give you an example: a company that manufactures wind turbines and is looking for a new way to manage its waste, can collaborate with a university and a PhD candidate to conduct research on the subject of interest. This is an innovation that is being implemented for the first time in Greece, and it contributes to making our children’s degrees more valuable and making our public universities more extroverted and open to entrepreneurship and the market.

But I confess that I did not mention the example of renewable energy sources by chance. I mentioned it because I want to show how the example of Halki shows even the most skeptics the benefits of using RES. So in Halki, for the first time in Greece, residents of a municipality produce the energy they consume and reduce their electricity bills to zero. 34% of PPC’s annual invoices were issued for zero, 40% under €100 and 26%, (mostly business accounts) up to €800.

How did this happen; From the operation of a state-of-the-art 1MW photovoltaic park created on the beautiful island of the Dodecanese within the framework of the GR-Eco Islands program. The managing body of the photovoltaic park is the Energy Community of Chalkis “Kalchion” with members of the residents of the island and with the participation of the Municipality of Chalkis with 50% of the cooperative capital. The goal of the GR-Eco Islands national initiative is for the Greek islands to become pioneers in the production of energy from the sun and wind, which they have in abundance, and to address the phenomenon of climate change, by promoting sustainable development and strengthening the green economy and cutting-edge technologies .

I am changing the subject to tell you about another important issue for the whole of society – that of the protection of workers and the checks on companies to comply with labor laws. For a few days now, the inspectors of the Independent Authority “Labor Inspection” now have access to 500 tablets connected to the Integrated Information System of the Labor Inspection and the upgraded “TOOL II”. This new way of controls is also combined with the implementation of the Digital Work Card to identify faster, more reliably and impartially the areas and sectors with the greatest delinquency in order to take measures.

Consistent with our commitment to the artistic world, the proposal of the three Working Groups we set up – one for theater and dramatic art, one for dance and one for music – was delivered on Friday with the aim of undertaking a legislative initiative to create public university-level faculty in the performing arts and the formation of a national Conservatory Education framework.

In the inter-ministerial groups, I remind you, all the co-competent ministries participated and there was extensive consultation with the representative sectoral and student unions. A country like ours with a great and long history in theater, dance and music, it is not possible not to have university level studies in the performing arts.

It is also worth noting the passing a few days ago of a protection framework for the hitherto undeclared and unpaid rehearsals of the artists. Specifically, it stipulates that rehearsal time is working time, i.e. it is paid according to the time of employment. It was a constant demand of the workers of the sector, since the undeclared and uninsured rehearsal was a perennial problem that no government had regulated until now. Finally, then, in another pending matter from the past from a government that proves in practice that it does not “hate” culture as we hear from some.

The panic button program aims to protect girls and women from another point of view. I’ve told you about this before, now I want to tell you that this app is now available to women who have been victims of domestic violence and are at increased risk. The women who received it now have the possibility, by pressing and holding the relevant – hidden – button on their mobile phone, to immediately alert the Police to intervene wherever they are. I hope it will make a positive and substantial contribution to the early prevention of incidents of violence. And a woman being saved is a huge benefit.

With resources from the Recovery and Resilience Fund “Greece 2.0” we are creating 106 new Mental Health Structures. Two of those concerning the support of dementia patients, their caregivers and their families were inaugurated and started operating a few days ago, one in Neo Heraklion and one in Arta. They are Day Centers that offer diagnosis, treatment and follow-up services for people who have problems with memory and other mental functions. A Mobile Care Unit was even created in Neo Heraklion. In both cases, the help from the Alzheimer Society of Athens and the president of the National Dementia Observatory was important.

Specialist scientists inform and educate the caregivers and the family environment of the patients, whose number, unfortunately, is also increasing in our country. It is estimated that 160,000 people have dementia and another 280,000 people have a mild mental disorder that is the precursor to dementia. If we calculate that for each patient the lives of two to three family members are affected as their caregivers, this condition directly and indirectly affects approximately 1 million Greeks.

Our priorities were and will be the security of the country. It was a great success of EYP in collaboration with EL.AS. to detect in time the terrorist network that was preparing an attack on a Jewish restaurant – synagogue in Athens. But security also means shielding the borders. This policy is reflected by the Evros fence along the Greek-Turkish border which is also the eastern European border.

The fence with the contract signed on Friday, will be extended by 35 kilometers, reaching a total of 140 kilometers. With autonomous surveillance systems and with new outposts of both the Army and the Police. And with even more border guards, who will increase by 250, the majority of whom will be from the Evros area.

One of the reasons we managed in recent years to prevent more than 250,000 illegal immigrants from entering Greek territory was the fence – we all remember the scenes at the border in 2020. This expensive but necessary project, the official opposition asks not to finance it the European Union, as under conditions it could, but the Greek taxpayer pays. I leave to your judgment how some turn a national need into a national exception.

I’ll close with the minimum wage – I won’t expand too much since I assume you already know about the increase. But I’m not sure it’s been emphasized enough that, while we promised before the election that we would increase it at twice the rate of growth, in the end we increased it at three times the rate. It’s one of the few times I’m proud that we broke our promise.

And here I come to the end of today’s review of a full week that brought small and big steps for the better. And thank you very much for your time!”