Speaking during his visit to Corinth Hospital, Sakellaridis called for an end to arbitrary practices by employers and demanded that workers’ safety be made a priority.
‘This is not just bad luck or an unfortunate incident’, he said, stressing that ‘at a time when refinery profits are soaring, health and safety conditions in workplaces are appalling, they are tragic’.
The New Left leader pointed to the repeated occurrence of workplace accidents across Greece, arguing that ‘the same pattern is repeated throughout the country. Workplace accidents, work-related accidents, happen constantly’.
He highlighted the severe understaffing of labour inspection services in Corinth, stating: ‘Here in Corinth, where we are now, there is only one technical inspector and two labour inspectors for 20,000 businesses’.
Sakellaridis called for an end to arbitrary conduct by employers and working conditions that, he argued, place workers’ lives and physical safety at constant risk.
‘There must finally be an end to this arbitrary conduct by employers, to this regime of medieval working conditions in which people are forced to work under circumstances where their lives and physical integrity are constantly threatened’, he said.
Concluding his remarks, Sakellaridis reiterated that workplace accidents should not be treated as isolated incidents but as symptoms of a broader employment model.
‘What is happening is a problem with the model of work. People’s lives, workers’ lives, must come before profits’, he stressed.
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