Following a meeting with Prime Minister Antonis Samaras, the leader of Democratic Left, Fotis Kouvelis, who appears against increasing the retirement age to 67 and layoffs in the civil service argued: “No measures can be imposed on a society that is disintegrating,” he said.

PASOK leader Evangelos Venizelos argued that Greece’s labour market rules must be the same as in the rest of Europe. He reiterated his demand for Greece’s fiscal adjustment period to be extended by two years, Kathimerini writes. On the other hand, he appeared optimistic: “There is small progress every day,” he said. “My experience tells me that we will reach a comprehensive agreement.”

Meanwhile, talks with troika head representatives continue. Finance minister Yannis Stournaras and the troika heads met yesterday afternoon aim at drafting around EUR 9-10 billion worth of measures from the total EUR 11.9 billion package, protothema.gr writes. The government aims to overcome the objections of the auditors, however the latter seem persistent in rejecting around EUR 2-2.5 billion of measures. According to the initial plan, Stournaras is about to present the list of measures to the Eurogroup tomorrow in Nicosia.

It is interesting to note that the Member States where the population has the highest life expectancy at the age of 65 are not necessarily the same as those with the most healthy life years at 65. Another interesting aspect of these indicators is the difference between women and men. In all Member States, women have a longer life expectancy at 65 than men, while for healthy life years at the age of 65, men have a higher number of years than women in ten Member States.

This information is published by Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union in connection with the first meeting of the European Joint Action on Healthy Life Years organised within the framework of the European Year for Active Ageing and Solidarity between Generations 2012.

In 2010, the longest life expectancy at 65 for women was observed in France (23.4 years), Spain (22.7 years) and Italy (22.1 years in 2009), and for men in France (18.9 years), Spain (18.6 years) and Greece (18.5 years). The shortest life expectancy at 65 for women was recorded in Bulgaria (17.0 years), Romania (17.2 years in 2009) and Slovakia (18.0 years), and for men in Latvia (13.3 years), Lithuania (13.5 years) and Bulgaria (13.6 years).

In 2010, the highest number of healthy life years at 65 for women was recorded in Sweden (15.5 years), Denmark (12.8 years), Luxembourg (12.4 years), Malta (11.9 years) and the United Kingdom (11.8 years), and for men in Sweden (14.1 years), Malta (12.0 years), Denmark (11.8 years), Ireland (11.1 years) and the United Kingdom (10.8 years). The lowest number of healthy life years for both women and men was observed in Slovakia (2.8 years for women and 3.3 years for men), followed by Romania (5.0 years) and Estonia (5.5 years) for women, and Latvia (4.9 years) and Estonia (5.3 years) for men.