Greece axes holiday bonus for computer use in civil service

Recession-wracked Greece plans to scrap a perk for its civil servants who enjoy an extra six days of holiday per year -- if they use a computer at work.

Administrative Reform Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said Athens wanted to axe the bonus that he dismissed as an "aberration."

"There is still the possibility in the civil service, in 2013, to get six days more holiday per year because an employee uses a computer, that is to say, almost everyone, Mitsotakis told Skai television late Thursday.

The move comes as the debt-laden eurozone country seeks to revamp its civil service as part of reforms to win bailout funds from the European Union and the International Monetary Fund.

Greece's civil service union, Adedy, said the perk stemmed from a decision in the 1990s to give employees 20 minutes off per day to protect them from eye damage from staring at a computer screen.

This was then extended on an annual basis, resulting in six days off per year.

Adedy said the scrapping of the benefit was "almost a detail compared to the reform that is currently being driven through in the civil service."

Greece has pledged to redeploy 12,500 civil servants by the end of September and another 12,500 by the end of the year, in order to receive the next instalment of its rescue loans.

Now in its sixth year of recession, Greece has been obliged to adopt austerity measures, including pay and pension cuts that have caused widespread resentment, in return for a massive EU-IMF bailout deal.