Alexis Tsipras strode in to a Greek hero’s welcome in the European Parliament yesterday, from allies on the left but also from far-right nationalists who hope Greece is about to start breaking up the euro and the EU.

The young Prime Minister, looking relaxed after EU leaders handed him a Sunday deadline to secure a bailout deal, pledged to deliver sweeping reforms of an economy crippled not just by recent, creditor-imposed austerity but by decades of corruption and political connivance with powerful vested interests.

He had to sit through angry lectures from lawmakers in Strasbourg who accused him of failing to make good on promises of change, of misleading voters who backed him in a referendum, rejecting credit terms and of disregarding poor fellow Europeans whose taxes went towards lending Greece billions of euro.

“Let me assure the house that, quite apart from the crisis, we will continue with our reform undertakings,” Tsipras said.

“We demand an agreement with our neighbours,” he said, declaring the vote on Sunday gave him a mandate for the request.

“But one which gives us a sign that we are on a long-lasting basis exiting from the crisis, which will demonstrate there’s light at the end of the tunnel.”

You are talking about reforms but we never see concrete proposals

Tsipras gave no detail on what legislation he would propose this week to meet conditions from international lenders, though he said Greece needed to reform state finances and labour laws.

Defending lack of action from his government since it was elected in January with a mandate to ease austerity, he said: “We have spent more time negotiating than we did governing.”

Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras addressing the European Parliament in Strasbourg, France, yesterday. Photo: Reuters

But the centrist leader in Parliament, Guy Verhofstadt, won applause of his own when he said: “I am angry because you are talking about reforms but we never see concrete proposals.”

Verhofstadt, once prime minister of Belgium, ran down a list of suggestions that included privatising banks and ending Greece’s special treatment for shipping magnates, the military and the Orthodox Church.

Warning that Greece was “sleepwalking” into losing the euro that the vast majority of its people want to keep, he said: “Show you are a real leader and not a false prophet.”

Winding up after more than three hours of argument, Tsipras appealed across the partisan divides, noting he had backing from his opponents in Athens to keep Greece in the euro. “We have ideological differences, we are divided on issues,” he said. “But this is a crucial time to join forces.”