The meeting of the Production and Trade Committee lasted a little more than 4 hours, in which the Minister of Infrastructure and Transport, Christos Staikouras informed the opposition MPs about the Greek railway. “I’m not here to beautify situations. Problems that have been accumulated from previous decades and to solve them requires a long-term effort,” he said.
Systems down
As the minister said, due to last year’s bad weather Daniel, signaling and remote control are out of order up to Larissa, but the restoration works are continuing. “The intersections of the stations are done at stations that are covered by signaling and remote control”, added Mr. Staikouras.
According to what he claimed, the reform of the railway sector is progressing and will comply with European requirements and will be of increased resilience.
“New unified modern public body that integrates OSE, TRAINOSE, GIAOSE and rolling stock. The new company assumes responsibilities as a railway infrastructure manager and is solely responsible for projects carried out on the railway network. European fund funding and implementation by the end of 2025. The first milestone for 2024 has already been submitted. Next milestone in July 2025”, said Mr. Staikouras.
“Over 1.2 billion euros in funding that did not exist two months ago. I talked about 18 projects. The situation in the Greek railway has the known pathogens accumulated. It takes persistence and it’s something that doesn’t happen overnight. The overall effort to have safe railways is appreciated”, underlined Mr. Staikouras, while sending a message to all those involved from the leadership, as he said, to the employees to demonstrate collective and individual responsibility, “so that we can upgrade safety and service quality. It takes constant effort.”
Fire from the opposition
After the minister’s introduction, the MPs of the opposition parties took the floor and severely criticized the government for its handling of the Greek railway, placing particular emphasis on the recent incident, where another serious accident almost occurred in Agios Anargyros, but also for the train 1531 which collided with fallen trees between Sfendalis and Afidna stations.
The president of Plefsis Eleftherias made a special reference to the accident in Tempe, referring to a crime that is being investigated by the European prosecutor. Zoe Konstantopoulou asked specific questions to the minister, while also referring to the relatives of the victims. As he said, even in school books it is noted that the safest mode of transport is trains. “How can a father say this to his child, when the child’s mother died in Tempi”, noted Ms. Konstantopoulou while also talking about Maria Karystianou’s presence at the investigative committee, where as she said her own testimony changed the course of the commission.
Staikouras: We don’t rub our hands
Taking the floor again, Christos Staikouras said that he does not avoid talking about the Tempe accident. “I will not talk about matters related to judicial investigations. You will allow me to tell you that I am not wringing my hands because there is no remote control system because of DANIEL”, noted the minister and added that “we are extremely unhappy that this happened (the bad weather), so we are not wringing our hands.”
And he went on to say that “the one issue is what we need to do as a political leadership to continuously enhance transportation safety. I presented them to you in terms of realism. A second issue is to have the conclusion of EDOSAAM on the Tempe accident”.
However, during the meeting, the ND MP, Christos Boukoros, who is among the 11 blue rebels, took the floor and left sharp points. As he said, we must make an account of the tens of billions that were given over time after our country joined the EU. and to make an investigation when this money was spent with a zero footprint on the improvement of the Greek railway. The deputy minister, Nikos Tachiaos, picked up the gauntlet wanting to defend the actions of the government with Mr. Boukoros answering again that he spoke for all governments in general.
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