Child benefits an investment in Poland’s future: PM
PR dla Zagranicy
Grzegorz Siwicki
31.03.2019 19:00
The Polish government’s flagship child benefit programme is an investment in the nation’s future, Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said on Sunday.
Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki (right) and Family, Labour and Social Policy Minister Elżbieta Rafalska (left) attend an event promoting the "Family 500+" programme, in the eastern town of Puławy on Sunday. Photo: PAP/Wojciech Pacewicz
The “Family 500+” programme aids parents nationwide and it also benefits the state as a whole, Morawiecki said as his governing conservatives marked three years since the child benefits were introduced.
"With this programme, Poland is changing beyond recognition,” Morawiecki declared.
He added that the handouts “have created a new space for the development" of Polish children and young people as well as the entire country.
Morawiecki vowed that his government would not abandon or trim the programme in the years ahead.
Social policy minister Elżbieta Rafalska said the “Family 500+” initiative was benefiting more than 3.6 million children nationwide.
She added that payouts to parents have totaled PLN 67 billion (EUR 15.5 billion, USD 17.5 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.
Party leader Jarosław Kaczyński said at a convention in Warsaw last month that the “Family 500+” programme would be expanded to include all single-child families regardless of income.
The expansion is planned for July 1, Poland’s PAP news agency reported.
(gs/pk)
Source: PAP