The fact that Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis presented the €1.75 per litre cap on heating oil as a success — while last year, during an already very difficult period, prices started at €1.10 — is drawing sharp criticism from SYRIZA officials, who argue that the energy cost of living crisis is turning into yet another government fiasco.
According to associates of Alexis Tsipras, the measure amounts to little more than a minor subsidy at the pump — one with limited and temporary effectiveness that, crucially, does nothing to address the inflated profit margins in fuel trading and refining. What is needed, they argue, is simultaneous intervention on taxation, profit margins, and the sector’s windfall profits.
What Alexis Tsipras’s associates are saying
“The Prime Minister didn’t announce energy measures. He announced that he would announce energy measures,” said SYRIZA officials, adding that Mitsotakis first floated a scenario in which heating oil would reach €2 per litre, only to then present a price below €1.75 as a victory. “He never explained how these figures were reached, what form of government intervention is planned, or how the price reduction would actually be achieved.”
A closer look at Kyriakos Mitsotakis’s announcements
They further noted that Mitsotakis “announced a ‘flat-rate increase’ to the heating allowance without specifying the amount of the increase, the eligible recipients, or how long it would last. He spoke of refinery participation without any concrete commitment. He raised the possibility of reinstating a cap on profit margins and deferred all the details to the following week.”
The same sources also point out that even the concept of a “flat-rate increase” remains unclear, given that the Prime Minister simultaneously invoked geographical and climate-based criteria. “This is not an energy policy. It is the government’s well-known communication arithmetic: first, construct a hypothetical reference point; then rebrand slightly lower prices as ‘support’; and finally, leave the bill empty. The response to the cost of living crisis is becoming yet another government fiasco. But winter is expected to be harsh, and citizens cannot heat their homes with announcements of announcements,” they said pointedly.
Awaiting the full polling results
Meanwhile, at SYRIZA headquarters, the party is waiting for the full results of all upcoming opinion polls in order to draw reliable conclusions about the impact its programme has made on public opinion, with corrective communications moves planned for the period ahead. Associates of the former Prime Minister note that the picture so far is particularly encouraging for them. They also add that over the coming weeks, the party will embark on tours across Greece to further develop and refine its policy programme.
