A multi-bill bundling together a raft of reforms – including an overhaul of the tax system and a streamlining of the civil service – was submitted in the Greek Parliament yesterday. The bill has to be voted in by July 19 if Athens is to secure the release of the first sub-tranche of a 6.8-billion-euro installment of rescue funding approved by eurozone ministers on Monday.

The bill comprises 108 articles; most of these set out the details of a new tax code while others detail plans to increase the central government’s oversight of local authority spending and plug a funding shortfall of some 1 billion euros attributed to the debts of the country’s main healthcare provider (EOPYY), among other reforms.

The bill abolishes school guards and foresees the abolition, as of late September, of the municipal police force, as part of a broader plan to immediately put 12,500 civil servants in a so-called mobility scheme where they would receive a reduced wage for several months ahead of being transferred to another post in the civil service or being dismissed.

The legislation also includes a provision dictating that courts must rule by November 1 on some 6,000 appeals by civil servants on short-term contracts whose terms have expired.

Source: Kathimerini.gr