SSO to expand welfare benefits
The Social Security Office is expanding welfare benefits from two births to unlimited children with the Bt400 a month pre-school allowance lifted from two to three children until they are six years old.
This was a New Year’s gift to subscribers, Jate Sirathanont, chief adviser to the National Legislative Assembly’s ad-hoc panel vetting an SSO amendment bill, told the press yesterday.
The second and third readings of the bill would be in the middle of January, he said.
The amendments aim to expand coverage to preventive healthcare promotion measures and extend the subscribers’ request period for seven compensation categories such as sickness, disability, childbirth and unemployment – from one year to two years.
Daily compensation paid for unemployment would be based on a subscriber’s highest and latest income rather than SSO-set figures.
The initial assistance to victims of medical malpractice would be equivalent to the National Health Security Office’s benefit, while the definition of an “employee” would include temporary workers and flat-rate annual contract workers.
SSO board
The SSO board would have seven representatives elected from employers and seven elected from employees. They would be required to declare assets and to be free from conflict of interest with the SSO.
The compensation for those who lose 50 per cent of their work capacity would be available for smaller losses while compensation for disability, which used to end at 15 years, would be paid for life.
The National Reform Council (NRC) unanimously backed the government to set up a national savings fund in line with the National Savings Fund Act to provide social welfare for 24.6 million elderly, plus workers not protected under the SSO scheme.
NRC chief Thienchai Kiranan also urged the NRC committee in charge of social reform to study the proposal’s details and look up related laws for three months before submitting the proposal to the NRC’s consideration.
A group of 20 NRC members made other suggestions such as creating a mechanism to promote saving by off-system workers, plus postponing the retirement age to 65-70 rather than the current 60, giving a tax incentive to newlyweds to have children and granting Thai citizenship to “high-calibre” foreign residents.
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