The Minister of State, responsible for Infrastructure and Transport, Giorgos Gerapetritis, focused on the reforms and the staff state, in a discussion in the context of his work 8th Delphi Economic Forum.

“In the minds of most citizens it is not clear what a staff state is,” said Mr. Gerapetritis, defining as a staff state, the state that coordinates, plans and monitors the reforms.

Making one account of the current government’s successes so far in this area, he emphasized that the model of public governance has changed, as there is a clear definition of responsibilities in the state.

“Today we have a clear governance system where there is accountability and efficiency and where the state is no longer the fiefdom of each minister but policies are implemented from the bottom up and not the other way around”adding how “the government operates on the basis of a unified government plan, where there is democratic accountability and where there has been an upgrade of the public administration and regular cabinet meetings are held.”

Mr. Gerapetritis noted that “90% of the matter managed by each ministry is now handled by the politically discolored civil servants and not by the political superiors. In addition, there is no overdue amendment.”

Referring to upcoming elections Mr. Gerapetritis noted that “if we are elected government again, we will continue the reforms. We should become bolder and go at a faster pace. The evaluation should be extended to other areas as well.”

Speaking about the judicial reform, he emphasized that our country is still slow in delivering justice and that this must change, as, among other things, this delay discourages investments.

Concerning the field of education, emphasized that the state faced the pathology of the lack of teaching staff at all levels and in one four-year period appointed 25 thousand teachers. Finally, he said that he has a complaint that the evaluation of teachers was not “embraced” by the entire political system.

He then noted that the government’s intentions, if elected, are to initiate the constitutional revision, and in particular article 16, so that private universities in the country can operate – under strict conditions and guarantees.

In closing, he gave some figures for the government’s successful effort in the field of digitization and emphasized that this year more than 800 transactions were made through the single digital government portal gov.gr, while if transactions via Taxis are also added, the number of digital transactions of citizens reaches 1.2 billion, which translates into 130 fewer hours in queues per year