With a request to the attending Minister of Rural Development Margaritis Schinas - and to the government as a whole - to condemn Adonis Georgiadis for his behavior, Nikos Androulakis began his intervention from the floor of Parliament.
Referring to phrases by the Minister of Health addressed to journalists, such as “You smoke joints” and “you are conspiracy theorists”, he asked: will you condemn all this? Do you have anything to say about these extremes?”, he stressed. With the remark to Mr. Schinas that “you are no longer an external observer, you are a member of the government and you must condemn it”.
He made extensive reference to the issue of energy price hikes: “We are still waiting for an answer from the government on reducing prices at the pump. Will this answer be a ‘gentlemen’s agreement’ like with the supermarkets and the banks, which you present as great benefactors?”, he noted.
Especially regarding the Special Consumption Tax on fuel, he added: “Come now, is it really an argument what you say, that reducing it costs 4 billion? That is how much abolishing it costs. We are talking about a reduction for a period of time so that citizens can cope. Where will you find the money? Make use of the fiscal space, but properly”.
Referring to the problems of farmers and livestock breeders, on the occasion of the fisheries bill, the president of PASOK pointed out, among other things:
- How can the producer, the farmer, the livestock breeder endure with the soaring cost? And then you talk about a demographic problem?
We see fallow fields and deserted villages everywhere.
- Don’t say “an end to corruption” to us, but to your predecessors, Mr. Voridis and Mr. Avgenakis.
- When the producer does not receive the subsidies on time, he cannot plan either the future or the present. When you give him compensation with a three-month delay, you widen his problem, his debt.
We proposed a one-stop agricultural portal: data should be submitted once, and the cross-checking of registries should be the responsibility of the administration.
- Did you do better with the livestock breeders? Is this the first time we have animal diseases in Greece? Why such a spread? Could it be due to the lack of plans, veterinarians?
How did foot-and-mouth disease spread across half of Greece, how did we slaughter 600,000 animals?
Is the solution the modern laboratories that you are not creating? The mobile units that do not exist?
And you tell the livestock breeders “wait and see how you will be compensated”?
- In the Dodecanese islands and in eastern Crete, hundreds of fishers need support. There too you failed.
What we propose for the primary sector is a patriotic choice, not merely an economic choice. Otherwise, the entire countryside will collapse.