Bearing gifts to the Greeks

Back in the 1990s Greece was given some €100m to compile a land registry. However, a few years later, in 2001, Brussels demanded the money back because of various delays and irregularities in the way the project was being carried out. Or not.

There are around 2 million illegal land holdings in Greece. Without a full land registry, it is easier to have burnt land reclassified as farmland and start building on it. That's part of the reason for the recent forest fires, which have killed over 60 people. MEPs have criticised Greece for infrastructure deficiencies in managing forests and property development. They also condemned the practice of allowing construction on protected and non-authorised areas, including burnt-down forests, which experts believe motivated arsonists as a way of obtaining new land.

So what's the best thing to do now? Let's see. It's partly the government's fault, they had plenty of time to address the causes, but they didn't do it. They were even given money to help them get it right, but they made such a hash of it that even the EU was appalled and demanded its money back.

I know ... I know ... let's give them some money.

In a resolution adopted on Tuesday (4 September), the European Parliament urged the European Commission to provide financial aid to the regions most affected by forest fires this summer with the cost of the damage assessed at some €1.2 to €4 billion.

If MEPs want to throw more money at the Greeks, let them have a whipround.