THE MINISTERS of Trade and Finance met yesterday morning and agreed on the basic terms of a package of measures to bring economic relief to primarily low income consumers in the wake of high oil prices, although officials still refuse to disclose details of the plan.
After the meeting, Lillikas said that over the following days teams from the two ministries would fine-tune the measures so that the completed package could be presented to the Council of Ministers for approval by no later than the first week of October. Lillikas noted that before turning the package over to the Cabinet, the ministry would hold talks with the various parties and unions so that they could offer input.
“We have agreed to act to support lower income citizens and other members of the population who will be most affected by the economic crunch over this period,” Lillikas said.
New Finance Minister Michalis Sarris said the two ministries were working closely together to make the plan as simple and effective as possible and said that it consisted of short-term and long-term plans that involved energy measures form both the public and private sector.
Sarris said the energy crisis would last for many years as a result of an increased demand for energy sources and so “the Cyprus economy will have to accommodate itself to these realities”.
A former employee of the World Bank, Sarris was assigned by Papadopoulos as Finance Minister on August 31, only a day after Makis Keravnos resigned to assume a senior position at Hellenic Bank.
In response to a question, Lillikas said that for the first eight months of 2005, Cyprus was ranked the sixth cheapest country in the EU for retail fuel prices, adding that even though Cyprus is in such an advantageous position, the government was nonetheless concerned “because the cost of living is increasing and the lower income levels are facing an economic crunch”.
When asked to respond to the allegations made by opposition DISY that the measures the government was proposing consisted of squeezing the middle-income classes to help the lower-income classes, Lillikas asked: “When DISY governed for 10 years, when did it ever give benefits – either to the mountainous regions or to the pensioners – when did it lower electricity rates for large families, and when did it ever import subsidised oil, thereby lowering the consumption tax on petrol?”
In reference to the high oil prices, United Democrats Party Chairman George Vassiliou told a news conference yesterday that unlike other European countries, Cyprus did not have a public transport system.
