‘A Silent Tax’: Greek Leaders Clash in Parliament Over the Cost of Living

Greece’s two refineries will help fund a cut in fuel prices through the end of August, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis told Parliament on Friday, as opposition leader Nikos Androulakis pressed him over seven years of price increases that, by his count, have outpaced every relief measure the government has tried.

Androulakis, who leads the center-left PASOK party, had put the urgent question to the prime minister, asking whether the government would finally act on prices or keep “being sorry and being angry.”

“The cost of living is a silent tax, the most unjust one imposed by this New Democracy government,” Androulakis told the chamber. Inflation, he argued, has taken far more out of Greek incomes than the government’s tax cuts and subsidies have given back. The average real annual wage grew by just 0.3% between 2019 and 2025, he said, citing the research institute of the General Confederation of Greek Workers (INE GSEE), the country’s largest trade union body.