Greece: Women are paying the price for austerity

Next Sunday, Greek people are given the opportunity to have a say on their future. Are we going to keep accepting austerity measures, cuts, privatizations, worker’s rights violations and the dismantling of the social welfare state? Or are we going to raise our voices to a loud NO against the assumption that “there is no alternative” to neo-liberalism?

The following intervention is painting a picture of the situation of women in Greece after five years of strict austerity measures. SYRIZA parliament member Afroditi Stampouli explains which were the consequences of the previous governments’ policies on women and presents the new government’s efforts and plans to make a change.  


The consequences of crisis and extreme austerity policies on men’s and women’s situation have been mentioned more than once. I am going to repeat some facts included in SYRIZA’s Department of Feminist Policy and Gender contribution to the party’s program, just to give an idea about the situation the new Greek government led by SYRIZA has to handle.

Employment rate for men aged 20-64 has decreased from 80,4% to 62,9%, while for women from 52,5% to 43,3% in 2014. Unemployment rate for women has reached 31,4% as compared to 25% for men. The previous governments tried to handle that using EU programs against women’s unemployment through the development of women’s entrepreneurship, with disastrous results. Encouraging entrepreneurship sounds like a bad joke in a country where more and more people have less and less money to buy anything, where shops close everyday under the weight of 70-billion-high red loans. The new labor ministry is working on unemployment programs, but it is not clear yet, if they will include positive discrimination for women. According to the National Statistical Service of Greece, poverty threatens 24,3% of women aged 18-64 as compared with 22,5% of men in the same ages and 18,3% of women over 65 years old for 15,9% of men. Poverty threatens 60% of single mothers of at least one child and 24,7% of women living in one-person households as compared with 19,3% of men. The first law of the new government is about relieving those living under extreme poverty. It offers free electricity, a house rent allowance and food allowance. Another new law includes a settlement on tax-debts and on the debts to social security funds while deleting several surcharges. This will not only offer financial relief to those in need, but will also allow many self-employed to issue tax certificates that will allow for the continuation of their employment. Another bill just voted is aiming to restore injustices concerning the public sector, made during the years of the memoranda, for example the suspension of entire public services, such as the municipal police, school guards and technical education departments of beauty care, hair dressing, nursing and childnursing obviously concerning mostly women. The famous 595 cleaning women of the ministry of Finance have been the first to come back. Also, there is a bill for the reopening of the Greek public radio TV broadcaster, ERT.

In addition, one of the first decisions of the new minister of “Production Reconstruction, Environment and Energy” was to cancel the increase of electricity price and to stop any privatization plan of the public electricity corporation.

Minimal wage,  been cut from 624 euros net last year, to 490 euros this year and to 427 euros for those younger than 25 years old, is to be restored by the next bill of the labor ministry. Pension cuts planed by the previous government, which would increase poverty for men and women, (women, though, definitely outnumber men in lowest pensions), have been canceled by the new government. These two issues are of the most difficult questions in the negotiations but also are some of the government’s red lines.

Workers’ rights are being systematically dismantled, collective labor agreements are being replaced by private ones, violations of labor legislation have been increased for men and women. Women, though, are also facing numerous violations on maternity protection legislation, such as maternity leaves and very often see their contracts not being renewed or are forced to resign. The national collective labor agreement is one of the red lines of the new government and a new bill uniting mother protection in every kind of occupation is one of our aims.

The loss of social insurance because of long-term unemployment of working women (or of husbands of non-working ones) is related with loss of social benefits, at the same time that social benefits provided by local authorities are heavily cut. This situation has forced women to return to their traditional roles, since childcare and care for older and sick relatives stop being the state’s responsibility and being provided by professionals thus becoming again the women’s duty like in traditional patriarchal mentality.

The minister of Social Solidarity (one of the 6 women in government) makes a great effort to refinance public structures and activities like assistance at home and “harmony” between professional and family life, which are founded by European programs finishing at the end of the year. On the other hand, mostly women have formed “solidarity for all” structures, including social health centers and pharmacies, social kitchens, social grocery stores, social classes, legal support to asylum seekers and to workers demanding their rights, alternative social spaces and time banks. So, tasks that according to stereotypes belong to the private sphere are brought to the public sphere with possibly liberating effects.

Access to medical care has also always been linked to the insurance status, but a welfare system used to provide uninsured women with pregnancy monitoring and childbirth in a public hospital free of charge, as well as early detection of breast and cervical cancer. Counselling about contraception, contraception pill prescriptions and intrauterine device insertions used to be provided free of charge in family planning centers. These benefits had already decreased, when in 2012 the Minister of Health introduced a fixed childbirth cost higher to what most insurance funds would cover. He had to readapt it to 700 euros for a natural childbirth and 1200 for a caesarian section. Uninsured Greek women who give birth in a public hospital owe these sums to the state, while the next minister of health doubled the cost for foreign uninsured women. It was the same minister of health, a supporter of the memoranda, who organized a pre-electoral public humiliation of HIV-positive women, alleged prostitutes, “in order to protect the Greek family” and in order to gain votes. His despicable decision has just been cancelled by the new minister of health and uninsured people have access to the National Health System without any discrimination for immigrants and refugees who have only to justify their stay in the country. It is worth to mention that birth rate in 2013 was 9 births for 1000 inhabitants and births in total were 12.300 less than deaths. Infant mortality rate that used to be on the decrease started increasing since 2010 and is now higher than Eurozone average. Fortunately nobody has dared to touch the abortion low, existing since 1986.

Poverty and insecurity are related to the increase of violence against women in the course of the last three years, as indicated by the increase of calls to  SOS emergency number, that provides socio-psychological support and counseling to women, victims of violence. The running EU program creating support and reception structures for women-victims of violence and their children, was going to end up in the end of the year but the minister of the Interior has promised to have it continued. Bringing Istanbul convention to the parliament is included in ministry’s program as well.

Although three conventions against human trafficking have been brought to parliament, Greece remains unfortunately a crossroad for human trafficking, mostly women’s trafficking aiming at sexual exploitation. Although police authorities have made made more than 100.000 immigrants and refugees suffer by operation of “Xenios Zeus” from August of 2012 to January of 2015, they have detected less than 100 trafficking cases in the same time period. There is a national coordinator doing his best, but much work on the issue is needed.

So, women in Greece are still suffering under the results of austerity and, although the new government do their best to reverse them, it is more difficult than expected. In a country where the Gross Domestic Product has decreased by 20% as long as the working people have lost 20% of their income and capitalists have increased their profits, strict and fair taxation is a priority. At the same time, as the national debt has raised from 126% to 177% of GDP, it is impossible to have growth and a recovery of the economy, unless the negotiations with the neoliberal European governments lead to a fair result.


This is the speech of Afroditi Stampouli, parliament member of SYRIZA and president of the Equality, Youth and Human Rights Committee, at the Feminist Congress of Left Block Party “Feminism Against Austerity”, held in Porto on May 16th-17th 2015.