Among other things, he spoke about the issue that arose about salaries in our country, compared to those in Bulgaria the Minister of State Makis Voridis, in an interview with SKAI on Tuesday morning.

It’s a debate that “comes primarily from the opposition”, was his introductory comment, immediately citing data: On 22 countries that have a minimum wage in the European Union, “we are right in the middle”. While with purchasing power as a criterion, “newer data shows thatand we are above six other countries, below the average”.

In his next sentence, Makis Voridis, after recalling the ten-year crisis, remarked that “it cannot be removed from Greece during this period”. Therefore, he argued, “to be fair in criticism, one should look at wages, purchasing power and inflation in 2019 and today.” However, “purchasing power is, in my opinion, the best indicator because it incorporates all the elements. Here you will see an improvement in purchasing power, as well as an increase in the average salary from 2019”, he pointed out while clarifying that “no one said that there are no problems or that there are no people who are struggling”. But, he insisted, “what we’re saying is that things are getting better.” In other words, he added, “seven years ago the poor were much poorer and much more difficult.”

At the same time, the Minister of State stated that various reports were refuted, so “there have been no monstrous electricity bills, no new wave of price hikes since September.” As for medicines, he cited the explanations of the Minister of Health: in this case, it is about “focused price increases on specific medicines, the price of which was fixed for many years, so fixed that they no longer exist on the market”. The result was that the Institute of Pharmaceutical Research and Technology (IFET) was forced to make imports, paying much more expensive specific drugs, he said on the subject.

Continuing the comparisons with the situation received by the current government, “in 2019 we got 20% unemployment and we have taken it to 9.5%”. Also, the New Democracy government made “four increases in the minimum wage, we took it to 560 and we have gone to 800 (euro)”.

At a later point in his interview, Makis Voridis remarked that employers cannot find workers in catering, hotels, public works. There are professions with zero unemployment, such as nurses, IT specialists. “We hold tenders for engineers in the State and they don’t come because they find much better pay in the private market,” he added. The picture I see is far from the collapse, hell or people dying in the streets that the opposition claims, he noted verbatim and countered that we have “a continuous, permanent, concerted and persistent effort by the government, which succeeds in improving these sizes. No, it’s not heaven, but it’s better.”

Regarding the political climate of the day, he argued that “one of the political advantages of this period – and we see it in other countries that do not have similar conditions – is political stability. This means a clear parliamentary majority and a parliamentary correlation that allows the government to implement its policy.

Characterizing, “always welcome” a thorough opposition criticism, he objected that today, on behalf of the opposition, “a flattening populist nihilistic discourse is being produced that is not at all useful in improving the government’s efforts. I don’t see an opposition contributing to this. I see an opposition that spews insults, that wants the universe destroyed.”

The interview ended with the topic of the President of the Republic: after repeating that “we have not opened the debate on the Presidency of the Republic at all”, he explained that “the selection of persons at these levels is a more complex process”, in other words “not it is limited to an assessment,” he concluded.