Be careful: the clock is ticking and time is running up! There is no space for delays and indecisiveness! Every one of us must be careful with budgets and costs because this crisis has not passed globally.

Years of unrestrained spending, cheap lending and failure to implement financial reforms left Greece badly exposed when the global economic downturn struck. This whisked away a curtain of partly fiddled statistics to reveal debt levels and deficits that exceeded limits set by the euro zone.