“The news will be very good,” a senior government official told TO BHMA, signaling the tone of the heating oil announcements expected around midday on Wednesday. According to sources, the intervention will be threefold: a subsidy on heating oil, discounts from refineries, and a heating allowance. Taken together, the measures aim to ease the burden on households ahead of what is shaping up to be a difficult winter.
The final price of heating oil is expected to settle “well below 1.75 euros per liter,” Kostis Hatzidakis said in an interview on Tuesday. The package is set to be unveiled by Minister of Environment and Energy Stavros Papastavrou and Deputy Minister of National Economy and Finance Thanos Petralias.
On the refineries’ role, Pavlos Marinakis, Deputy Minister to the Prime Minister and Government Spokesman, told the financial daily Naftemporiki that their discounts deliver more immediate relief to consumers than a one-off windfall tax would. He also said he expects the support to be extended, while stressing that the decision rests with the refineries themselves.
The announcements carry political weight as well. The Maximos Mansion is looking for a reprieve in the polls as pressure on households remains intense. The pledges unveiled at the Thessaloniki International Fair gave New Democracy a modest lift, but not the rebound the government had hoped for. Meanwhile, the cost-of-living crisis has taken on the character of a Lernaean Hydra: as soon as one source of price hikes is tackled, new ones emerge. A new Eurostat survey illustrates the point, showing that one in two Greeks cannot cover unexpected expenses, the worst showing in the European Union.
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Alongside its national measures, Athens is seeking additional room for support at the European level. Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis travels tomorrow to the EU summit, having already set out Greece’s requests in a letter to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.
Responding to a question from TO BHMA on Monday, Marinakis pointed to the letter, saying the government wants emergency support measures excluded from EU spending limits, since current fiscal rules block new measures unless they are offset by permanent ones. Without that exemption, he said, Greece would have to stay within its spending ceilings like every other member state. He also accused the opposition of proposals that risk returning the country to fiscal surveillance.
The government is keeping expectations low. Speaking to Naftemporiki, Marinakis declined to prejudge either Brussels’ response or any follow-up measures, adding that if the answer is positive, decisions would be made based on the recommendations of the government’s economic team.