Civil servants down by a quarter million

July 21, 2014
Written by E.Tsiliopoulos

The number of civil servants dropped by over 267,095, in the period 2009-2013, from 952,625 in 2009 to 675,530 in 2013. The outflows are due to retirement, but mainly due to the dramatic reduction in contract employees, whose contracts were no longer updated.

The data from the Ministry of Administrative Reform for contract employees show that in 2009 temporary staff reached 148,634, while in December 2013 the figure stood at 12,196. This means that at least 136,438 contract employees were outside the σtate sector after the non-renewal of their contracts.

Tenured staff in the public sector in 2009 was 692,907 people, while in December 2013 the number had fallen by about 100,000, reaching 599,207 employees. In May 2014 there was a further reduction, to 590,908 employees.

Based on official figures, the majority of the regular staff in May 2014 were employed in the following ministries:

Ministry of Defence: 87,684 employees (including uniformed)
Ministry of Education: 177,225 (teachers)
Health ministry: 82,389 (doctors)
Ministry of Citizen Protection: 62,519 (police officers)
TAB: 83,996 employees
Treasury: 15,442 employees
Ministry of Justice: 15,265 employees
Department of Labor 16,779 employees
Ministry of Shipping: 8.079 employees
Decentralized Administration: 6,579 employees