Today is the last cabinet meeting of 2025 with the agenda of 2026 reforms and a new message from Mitsotakis to the blockades

This is the successor format of the now-famous "blue envelopes", with a codification of the basic reforms and projects that ministers are called upon to "run" with rapid procedures, as 2026 will be a de facto election year. After all, yesterday's resignation of general secretaries who want to become politicians and the announcement of their candidacies in specific electoral districts were developments indicative of the preparations.

In his introductory statement, Mr. Mitsotakis will present step by step the government priorities of 2026, which will be a full government year, before we enter 2027, which will be an election year by object. Afterwards, the presentation of the main priorities per ministry will be made by the Deputy Prime Minister Kostis Hatzidakis and the Minister of State Akis Skertsos, who will also give an analytical press conference immediately after the New Year. According to information, at the core of the government plan are 20 basic reforms and 20 major projects that the ministries are called upon to carry out.

Today's cabinet meeting, however, also has other material, as George Floridis and Yannis Bougas will present the Ministry of Justice's bill for the Unified Digital Registry for Monitoring Corruption Cases, followed by the presentation by Yannis Kefalogiannis of the bill for the reform of the system of prevention, preparedness and response to forest fires and other natural, technological or man-made disasters. Finally, there will be a presentation by Dimitris Papastergiou on practical instructions for the use of artificial intelligence by ministries, while for the first cabinet of 2026, the presentation by Konstantinos Kyranakis on interventions based on traffic in the Attica Basin was extended.

Message to the blockades
Today's cabinet meeting, however, is taking place in the shadow of the agricultural mobilizations, but also of the criminal prosecution being carried out against the "general" of the Malgara blockade, Costas Anestides, for illegal subsidies from OPEKEPE.

Mr. Mitsotakis is expected in his introductory statement to once again send a message of dialogue to the farmers, based on the framework of demands that the government also recognizes. However, Mr. Mitsotakis will also factor into the equation the social suffering and disruption of economic activity during the holiday season, with obvious impacts so far on tourism and trade from the “heart attack” on the highways.

Regarding the Anestidis case, government officials make it clear that the prosecution is not at all vindictive, nor is the government conducting audits. Simply, in this case, the OPEKEPE abscess is being broken with cross-checks by the AADE. “Inspections are being conducted on tens of thousands of subsidy cases, a percentage of which were flagged as red or problematic throughout Greece, and various findings are released every week, and the full set of findings is released every 1-1.5 months,” government officials emphasize.

Deadlock with the "hardliners"
More broadly, however, government officials recognize the sense of deadlock in the discussion with the farmers, as long as the "hardliners" prevail in the blocs. Obviously, in the background there is an approach between government officials and representatives of several agricultural blocs, but government officials emphasize that, if the discussion is not comprehensive and in a coordinated manner, then any decisions will not have general legitimacy. In this light, a dialogue between the government and... half of the blocs will be a gift for nothing.