The new Single Social Benefit combines 13 social benefits and the Government decided to change the rules to restrict access to a mechanism that represents 557 million euros in public expenditure. Current beneficiaries (153 thousand in the last year) of any of them – old-age social pension, special disability social pension, widow’s pension, orphan’s pension, extraordinary solidarity supplement, social unemployment benefit, social insertion income, social benefit for clinical risk during pregnancy, social benefit for termination of pregnancy, social benefit for adoption, initial parental social benefit and social benefit for the need to travel to a hospital located outside the island of residence for delivery – must be aware of these changes, because they may find themselves excluded from State support at the time of their renewal.
It is certain that there will be no changes to the support already in place, as the Prime Minister assured, the changes may happen when it is time to prove the conditions to renew the support, writes the newspaper Expresso. The network tightens particularly in the three social benefits that consume the most public resources: RSI, social old-age pension and social unemployment benefit. Together, they represent not only 97% of the total number of beneficiaries, but also the value of total expenditure.
In the proposal that reached Parliament on Tuesday, and which will be discussed in the coming days, it is assumed that Only those who reside in the country, are unemployed by someone else’s will, are not in pre-trial detention and do not have movable assets and movable assets that exceed the social support index (IAS) by 30 times, that is, around 16,114 euros, are entitled to the new PSU.
This includes, as the name suggests, savings of any kind – even savings certificates – cars, motorbikes or other valuable movable assets.
Currently, the limits on the assets that are allowed to be owned are much higher than what the Executive now proposes. And there is another difference: this new asset value, according to the document, refers to the entire household, leaving it unclear whether for the purposes of attributing PSU, weighting will be done per member of that same household.
There are significant cuts in the social old-age pension, as currently those who receive this support only have to comply with limits in relation to their overall income, with no restrictions with regard to assets; as well as social unemployment benefit, for which current rules dictate that the beneficiary can have up to 240 IAS (128,900 euros) in movable assets, if he becomes unemployed and does not have sufficient discounts to access unemployment benefit.
The same level of cut occurs in the RSI, where the limit for beneficiaries goes from an asset that represents up to 60 times the IAS (around 32 thousand euros) to one that does not exceed 30 IAS for everyone (16 thousand euros), in addition to now also accounting for movable assets.
Concept of social work to be clarified
The new PSU has already caused a lot of excitement among deputies, with social work being one of the proposals that caused the most buzz in recent days. Remember that the proposed law determines that the beneficiaries of this PSU, as well as any member of their household who is of legal age, provide “social solidarity activities”. However, this concept has not yet been explained by the Government, despite there being some indications: There is a maximum limit of 15 hours and cannot exceed eight hours per day. Anyone between 18 and 25 years old, however, may be required to work more hours. Furthermore, anyone who has already renewed their support three times will now have to work 20 hours a week instead of the 15 hours initially determined.
Anyone who refuses to carry out these activities immediately loses their right to the PSU for two years, if they are the holder of it, and for one year if they are a member of the household who refuses. In the same sense, anyone who has an older child at home, who is not studying and does not register at the employment center, also loses the benefit.
The value of the PSU itself is yet to be realized, awaiting a regulatory decree.
