Handouts to benefit 6.8m children in Poland: family minister
PR dla Zagranicy
Grzegorz Siwicki
17.04.2019 01:00
The Polish government’s generous family support system will cover 6.8 million children nationwide after it is expanded in July, the country’s family and social policy minister has said.
Poland's Family, Labour and Social Policy Minister Elżbieta Rafalska. Photo: PAP/Leszek Szymański
Elżbieta Rafalska was speaking after the Polish government on Tuesday approved a plan to expand its flagship “Family 500+” child benefit programme to include all families with children under 18 regardless of income.
Rafalska told state broadcaster TVP Info on Tuesday evening that, after the expansion, child benefits would cost the government an extra PLN 9.6 billion (EUR 2.3 billion, USD 2.5 billion) this year and a total of PLN 41 billion next year.
She added that payouts to parents have totaled PLN 70 billion (EUR 16.4 billion, USD 18.5 billion) since the programme was launched on April 1, 2016.
Poland’s socially conservative Law and Justice government, which came to power in late 2015, aims to ease the burdens of child rearing by giving families with two or more children a handout of PLN 500 (EUR 116, USD 130) a month per child.
Poorer families receive the allowance even if they have just one child.
Under the plan approved by the Polish government on Tuesday, the “Family 500+” programme will now be expanded to include all single-child families regardless of income.
The new rules are set to come into force on July 1.
Poland spends 2.7 percent of its GDP on state benefits for families and children—one of the highest figures in the 28-nation European Union, according to a newspaper.
(gs/pk)
Source: TVP Info, PAP