Kyriakos Mitotakis spoke with citizens who had gathered in Velestino, and had previously visited the renovated Health Center of the area, as well as the Cooperative of Nea Anchialos.

The prime minister spoke about the government’s investments in public health, the rehabilitation works being carried out in the region after the damage caused by the “Daniel” bad weather, as well as government initiatives aimed at strengthening the middle class. At the same time, he spoke about efforts to open new jobs with better wages, as well as the actions taken to address long-standing problems of the OPEKEPE type.

In detail, Mitsotakis said in his address:

“My dear Mayor, my colleagues in the government and parliament, my friends,

It is with great pleasure that I am with you today in this historic place, which I am visiting to inaugurate, although it has already been put into operation, a very important project for the local community, which is none other than the fully renovated Health Center of your Municipality.

I had the opportunity a short while ago to tour its facilities, but I think you know much better than I do, as you are users of its services, the condition in which we received it some years ago and how in a very short period of time, under the supervision of the Ministry and the responsible Governor of the Ministry of Health, it was transformed not into a Health Centre, but essentially into a small state-of-the-art hospital, fully staffed to meet the needs of the wider area.

And it’s worth noting that the funding for this project came from Recovery Fund resources. Five years ago, in a complex negotiation, we managed to secure for our country €36 billion of additional resources. The results of this negotiation are now beginning to be seen everywhere in Greece. Health centres, such as the one in Velestinos, we will have renovated, count them, 160. I repeat, 160 in the whole country.

With the resources of the Recovery Fund, Emergency Departments in more than 80 hospitals are being renovated. We are investing substantially in public health, in building equipment, in human resources, in preventive examinations.

If you get a message to do a preventive test, please don’t neglect it, please don’t neglect it. 60,000 of our fellow citizens in total have been identified with diseases they were not aware of. Among them are tens of thousands of women with early breast cancer who, if they had not received a notice from the Greek state to go get a screening mammogram, would not even know about it.

This means investing in health in practice and protecting our fellow citizens before they get sick. This is the big change we are initiating in public health in our country.

But I am in Magnesia today so that I can inspect facilities that were affected by natural disasters on the one hand.

I was a short while ago in the very beautiful Cooperative of Nea Anchialos. Two years ago we had to manage a very problematic fire. There was a lot of damage to the Co-op at that time. Today the Cooperative is fully operational. Why? Because the state aid stood by it and was able to restore the significant damage that was done. Today the Cooperative is functioning, producing excellent products and the future is optimistic.

However, the Mayor also spoke about the great natural disaster of “Daniel”. And you know very well, I have visited Thessaly many, many times. We have a very close cooperation with all the competent bodies, with the Region. Billions of euros are falling on Thessaly so that we can restore the damage.

The contracts for the Daniel road projects have already been signed. The contracts for the railway works have already been signed. Irrigation rehabilitation has already begun and many have already been completed.

Because, indeed, this very big natural disaster has reminded us of something, friends: that unfortunately the climate crisis is already with us and we need to make sure that we are armored as a country and resilient as a country.

And I say this, why? Today is World Environment Day – let’s not forget that – and we have an obligation as a state and as a local government, first and foremost, to protect the most precious resource that nature no longer gives us so generously, and I’m talking about water management.

The Water Management Agency of Thessaly has started its work, with some delays but it will increase its pace. We will invest a lot of money in the shielding of Thessaly in projects that are both civil protection and water management projects. We are already investing in closed irrigation networks.

But we need the cooperation of all of you so that we can limit any waste and preserve water as the apple of our eye, because it is a factor in the survival and prosperity of the whole of Thessaly. Let us remember this today, friends, as it is World Environment Day.

And after my visit here in Velestino, I will be in the industrial zone of Volos and will visit two investments, two important plants that create many jobs.

The first one repairs the trains of Line 1 of the Electric Line in Athens. In 2026 in Athens we will have new trains, fully repaired. The work is being done here in Volos, with many jobs being created, so that we can offer our fellow citizens in the basin decent transport.

And immediately afterwards I will visit an innovative industry that is investing in the defence sector. It has been investing in the defence sector for many years. Not many people know that here, just down the road in Volos, the entire Leopard shell is made, the Patriot missile launch base is made, the torpedo boxes for the Belharra frigates are made.

I want to remind you that just yesterday we saw the very beautiful pictures, three Belharra frigates now in the water, all three will be delivered in 2026, and the acquisition of the fourth frigate, “Themistocles” is also underway.

But what we are interested in, friends, in this new landscape that is changing, is not simply buying weapons systems from abroad and giving billions to companies that create jobs abroad. What we are now asking of everyone is that there is added Greek value in the production of 25%.

What does this mean? That the money we invest in our national defense will be returned to our country in well-paying jobs. That is the goal of this policy: to develop cutting-edge know-how and technology ourselves, which – why not? – we can export abroad.

And this, why does it matter, friends? It matters because, first and foremost, our concern and the bet – I want to remind you – of the second four-year term was one: better wages and more jobs for every Greek.

We have created more than 500,000 jobs in our country in the last six years. Unemployment has gone from 17% to 8%. The young children who are with us today and who are taking exams to enter the university, the Greek public university, will know that they will have a much better chance of finding a job afterwards and not of moving away. And the brain drain has become a brain gain and for the first time many more are returning to our country than those who leave.

And I say that because some people have reappeared in the public debate recently trying to rewrite history and make it black and white, but they picked the wrong time.

Think about it for a moment. This is June 2025. I don’t need to remind you where we were at this time in 2015, ten years ago. With banks closed, with pensioners outside the ATMs, with pensions and wages slashed, with the country on the verge of bankruptcy and with young people, yes, then leaving Greece because they saw no progress.

We have made a lot of progress, friends. We have not fixed everything and we still have a lot of work to do. And I am the first to tell you that where mistakes are made, we recognize them, we correct them.

We have had problems over time with OPEKEPE, and you know it. This is nothing new. The issue hasn’t arisen in the last five years. I took a bold decision and said: no more OPEKEPE, it will go to the AADE and farmers and ranchers will receive their subsidies on time and without fraud. So that the real beneficiaries get the money and not those who may declare animals that exist only in their imagination.

These are difficult and bold decisions, but in this fight we will continue.

We are closing out two years of government, a few weeks from now. You have trusted us, you have given us a very clear mandate to carry out the work of government. We have two more years, we will run even faster and you can be sure and confident that in 2027 the Greek citizens will again trust us.

Let me say a big thank you for braving the heat, today seems to me to be the first day here…

To the pensioners, I am glad you say that, it is worth saying that. Look out for what it means to have tidy public finances and to be effective in dealing with tax evasion. I announced a month ago that we achieved a financial performance for the past year that was much better than we expected. At a time when many European countries are being forced, watch out, by the European Commission, to go through austerity measures, tidy up.

We are producing surpluses. How do we return these surpluses to society? Apart from the increases that we are giving, yes, we are the ones who said that every November what was a one-off payment, we are now institutionalising it and there will be a permanent support of 250 euros every November for pensioners, because the economy allows us to do it.

And we did one more thing for those who rent houses. And I know that this is not something that may not be so much about the Greek periphery, but it is very much about urban centers, it is about young people and young women who are going today and trying to start a family. We said that we would be returning in November a declared rent back to all tenants. It is a support, not an insignificant one. We want more and we will do more.

The Katrougal Law is already changing in practice, “erasing” the personal difference. You know this, pensions are increasing, for the first time.

And one more thing, please be patient, because in September we will have the opportunity to make our announcements at the Thessaloniki International Fair for the fiscal year 2026.

What I told you, the rents, the support for pensioners in November, which is now regular and not extraordinary, these are not for 2026, these are for 2025. We didn’t budget for them, they’re above what we budgeted for.

Well, in 2026 we will turn our attention to those who have been tested the most, to supporting the middle class, and you can be sure and confident that as the economy outperforms, the dividend of growth will return to pensioners, to workers, to the middle class, to the primary sector, to Greece waking up early, to those who work hard and expect fairness from the state in the way we treat them.

I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for being here with us today. I wish you all the best, the new Health Centre well and may we always meet at such pleasant gatherings.

Be well, thank you very much.”