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The Cyprus government had 300 more people on its payroll in July than it did a year earlier, pushing total state employment to 53,747.
For a country where the size of the government workforce is already a regular topic of debate, the latest figures will inevitably raise a familiar question: Is the state becoming even bigger?
The short answer is yes, but only slightly, and mostly because more people are working in education.
According to the Statistical Service, government employment increased by 0.6% compared with July 2025. Across the first seven months of the year, the average increase was smaller, at 0.3%.
The Education Service accounted for most of the growth. It added 427 workers in one year, bringing its total workforce up by 2.6%.
Interestingly, the number of permanent education employees barely changed. The real increase came from people working on open-ended and fixed-term contracts.
Open-ended contract workers in education jumped by 25.7%, from 921 to 1,158. Fixed-term employees also rose by 7.3%, reaching 3,181.
This means the state is relying more heavily on employees who are not traditional permanent civil servants, even though many may work for the government for years.
Across the entire government sector, 32,935 people held permanent positions in July. Another 9,509 worked on open-ended contracts, 4,578 were employed for fixed periods and 6,725 were paid by the hour.
The core public service actually became smaller, losing 230 workers over the year. Permanent, open-ended, and hourly-paid positions all decreased, although the number of fixed-term employees rose by 6.4%.
Employment in the Security Forces increased slightly, adding 103 workers to reach 13,841.
There was also a dramatic-looking 99.6% fall in fixed-term Security Forces staff, from 250 people to just one. However, this was mainly because a specific group of contracts ended and was not renewed, not because of a large-scale reduction in police or military staffing.
So while Cyprus’ state workforce has grown again, the figures do not show a hiring spree across every government department. The increase is mainly in education, driven by workers on open-ended and temporary contracts rather than a major rise in traditional permanent civil servants.
Still, with almost 54,000 people now directly employed by the government, the debate over whether Cyprus has the right number of public workers, and whether taxpayers are receiving better services in return, is unlikely to disappear.
*With information from the Cyprus Statistical Service
