Accelerating settlement of support policies for targeted groups under Resolution No.68

After completing the settlement of rental and food support under provincial People's Council’s Resolution No.04-NQ/HDND and provincial People's Committee’s Decision No.12-QD/UBND for targeted groups, provincial Department of Labor, War Invalids and Social Affairs (DoLISA) is focusing on promoting support policies for targeted groups, including employees who suspended labour contracts or took unpaid leave, business households...in accordance with the Government’s Resolution No.68-NQ/CP.

Nearly VND1.85trillion spent

In this fourth wave of Covid-19 epidemic, provincial DoLISA has focused on solving urgent allowances such as rental subsidy for workers staying at lodging facilities with the level of VND 300,000 per person under provincial People's Council’s Resolution No.4 and food subsidy for employees at lodging facilities with difficult circumstances with the level of VND500,000 per person under provincial People's Committee’s Decision No. 12, aiming to help employees overcome difficulties during the local social distancing period. Another expenditure directed by provincial DoLISA to quickly settle and simplify procedures so that employees can get allowances as quickly as possible is to pay support for self-employed workers, including lottery ticket sellers, gardeners, barbers helpers, haircuts…under the Government’s Resolution No.68. These sources of support have helped employees across the province to solve many difficulties during the local social distancing period.

The province has completed rental and food support for lodgers affected by Covid-19 pandemic under provincial People's Council’s Resolution No.04-NQ/HDND and provincial People’s Committee’s Decision No. 12-QD/UBND

According to the Resolution 68, there are 12 support policies for employees facing difficulties, due to Covid-19 pandemic. Over the past time, along with quickly providing support for self-employed laborers, provincial DoLISA has also implemented many other support policies such as suspending the payment of retirement and survivorship funds, supporting vocational training and job changes; supporting employees with their labour contracts temporarily terminated; supporting children and people who are being treated for Covid-19 or under medical isolation…Noticeably, provincial DoLISA has so far supported VND 78.516 trillion for 26,172 business households.This support policy has been completed by 7/9 localities in the province.

Nguyen Ngoc Hang, Deputy Director of provincial DoLISA said that for business household group, the support policy under the Government’s Resolution No.68 is only for business households with business and tax registration. Provincial DoLISA has flexibly coordinated with provincial Tax Department to send a list of business households to each commune and ward. This has helped this group quickly get allowances from the Government’s Resolution No.68.

Support policies for employees solved quickly

In this 4th wave of Covid-19, workers have faced the most difficulties. This is because after about 3 months of making social distancing measures, the province has had hundreds of thousands of workers taking unpaid leave. Only a small number of employees are facilitated by enterprises to produce under the "3 on-site" production model.

During the local social distancing period, most workers have got care in terms of food and necessities from localities, departments and sectors under the all-level direction of “no one goes go hungry”. In addition, employees are supported VND800,000 per person under provincial People's Committee’s Resolution No.04 and Decision No.12 and a number of workers, including F1, F2 cases, are supported because of Covid-19 infection. The number of employees receiving support under the Government’s Resolution No.68 is very small.

Mrs.Hang said that under the Resolution No. 68, employees who have suspended labour contracts or taken unpaid leave will enjoy one-time support of VND 3.7 million. Most enterprise have selected this support police for employees. However, over the past few months, the province strictly implemented social distancing measures with many "frozen, locked" places, causing difficulties in travel, so the progress of registration and settlement for documents relating to this targeted group is somewhat slow.

According to a report by provincial DoLISA, only 59,872 employees in this targeted group have received VND 206,478 billion from the Government’s Resolution No.68. Possibly speaking, this is a rather modest number compared to the number of workers affected by the pandemic in the province. In recent days, when the "green zones" are continuously opened, helping people’s travel get more convenient. The administrative departments of enterprises in the province have also come to their headquarters to make dossiers on support for employees affected by the pandemic and send them to the Divisions of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs of districts, towns, cities. Localities have also received such dossiers from enterprises.

“During the last social distancing period, all-level trade unions, websites, Zalo groups, Facebook and the mass media disseminated support policies with the content that employees are only entitled to receive one-time support from  the Government’s Resolution No. 68. However, there are still employees registering to receive VND 1.5 million from the self-employed group. Therefore, the Division of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs of districts, towns and cities are rechecking this issue. If employees have received VND1.5 million, they will be not got other support policies in the Resolution No.68", Ms. Hang added.

For employees getting subsidies under the Resolution No.68 as quickly as possible in the coming days, provincial DoLISA has coordinated with VNPT Binh Duong to apply a software on screening the list of people who have received support from support packages, thereby approving relevant applications as quickly as possible.

As of September 23, provincial DoLISA spent nearly VND 1.85 trillion in subsidy for 3 targeted groups. Of the total figure, more than VND 802 billion was the support expense under the Resolution No.68; more than VND 369 billion under Resolution No. 04 and more than VND 648 billion under the Decision No.12. As of now, provincial DoLISA has completed the approval of support expenses under the Resolution No.04 and Decision No.12. There have also been 14,386 units with 1,019,802 employees enjoying the reduction of VND475.35 billion from support policies relating to reducing the contribution to the insurance fund for occupational accidents and diseases, suspending the payment of retirement and survivorship funds

Reported by Quang Tam-Translated by Kim Tin