The president of PASOK-Movement of Change, Nikos Androulakis, continued his contacts with social organizations. Earlier in the afternoon he met with the president and secretary of the Panhellenic Federation of Food and Tourism Workers (POEET).

“The tourism sector has developed further in recent years in our country. The direct revenues exceed 28 billion euros in the budget of our country. More than 32 million tourists come to Greece every year, and yet we see phenomena such as shortages of more than 80,000 personnel, which reveals that thousands of Greeks who could work in this sector, do not choose it due to working conditions and prospects. For this reason, we consider that collective agreements are very important, as well as controls in the market in order to respect the rights of employees”, Mr. Androulakis emphasized in his statements. He reiterated the proposals of PASOK-Movement of Change to extend the maternity allowance from 6 to 9 months for seasonally working mothers and to restore the duration of the unemployment allowance to five months.

As he said, “we seek when a sector of the economy is doing very well, that the benefits spread to society and especially to the workers, so that businesses prosper, but society prospers as well.”

He added that the figures are revealing from the European Commission, which show that instead of earnings converging with wages as in the rest of Europe, there is a complete divergence. “We are third in business profits in Europe out of 27 and penultimate, -26th and in deep-, in wages. This needs to change, especially in this sector, which is developing rapidly, which should be done with rules of sustainability and respect for the environment, because hypertourism can make us strangers in our own country. I am not saying to put an obstacle in the business, but to put in rules for a sustainable business for the Greek society” noted Mr. Androulakis.

For his part, the president of POEET, Giorgos Hotzoglou, emphasized that short-term rentals have now outnumbered hotels in terms of beds.

“The situation in our industry is described in the darkest colors. We are running with 80,000 job vacancies according to employer figures and that says something in itself. Apart from the occasional phenomena of employer arbitrariness, we feel abandoned in the winter months, as the unemployment allowance remains under the memorandum provision at three months” characteristically noted Mr. Hotzoglou.

The president of PASOK-Movement of Change was accompanied to the meeting by the member of parliament of Lasithi and responsible for KTE Tourism Development, Katerina Spyridaki.