Clients of social service facilities should depart with more money than they do now after paying the fees, according to a Labour Ministry proposal. As opposed to the current €39.62 they should keep €49.52 after paying for a year-long stay in the facility. This is 25 percent of a monthly living wage, a rise of the current 20 percent, according to the proposal. The sum they keep after paying for a week-long stay should stand at least 60 percent of the living wage, an increase from 50 percent they currently keep.
The proposed changes come as part of an amendment to the law on social services, the SITA newswire reported on August 13.The limit of the remaining sum of clients who pay for daily stay with food should increase from 0.7 times of living wage to the full living wage, which represents an increase from current €138.66 to €198.09. If the client with a daily stay does not pay for food or uses a day care, the limit of the sum they should increase from 1.3 times the living wage to 1.4 times, as reported by SITA.
The proposed changes apply to clients with pensions between €255-€350 per month. The total number of such clients is about 16,674, according to the Labour Ministry.
Other changes include a drop in the financial contributions for municipalities and self-governing regions operating the social service facilities, and increase in the contributions to private providers. Moreover, social services would be financed from several new sources, SITA wrote.
The proposed changes were criticised by some providers at social service facilities. For example, the proposal to increase the remaining sum of the clients will burden their relatives, Zuzana Hervayová, head of a senior citizen home in Komárno, told the Sme daily.
Source: SITA, Sme
Compiled by Radka Minarechová from press reports
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