Govt Urged To Relax Criteria For Jobless Subsidy

A community group on Wednesday urged the government to relax the application criteria for its temporary unemployment relief scheme, so more grassroots families affected by the Covid pandemic can benefit.

Grassroots Wishes interviewed 311 people and found that half of them had been jobless in the past three months. For those who were lucky enough to be in a job, half had suffered a pay cut.

The group said 75 percent of the respondents said they were not eligible for the unemployment subsidy because it’s only aimed at those who recently lost their job due to the current outbreak.

To be eligible for the HK$10,000 subsidy, applicants must have worked for at least a month from October to December last year and must have been jobless for 30 straight days.

Their monthly salary before they became unemployed must have been less than HK$30,000.

But the group said the high threshold for the one-off subsidy has made it very difficult for underemployed people to get assistance.

A catering worker surnamed Chan said her monthly income has been reduced by a few thousand and her husband has been underemployed during the current outbreak, but they are not eligible for the subsidy as they have not been jobless for at least a month.

Li Ngai-ying, the group’s researcher, said the government should review the criteria of its welfare schemes so that more people can benefit from them.

“We suggest that the Hong Kong government should reopen the application for the Temporary Unemployment Relief Scheme. For the long term, we strongly suggest that the government should relax [the application criteria] of the Temporary Unemployment Relief Scheme and Working Family Allowance Scheme for the residents based on their basic needs,” she said.

The group also called on the administration to provide regular subsidies for the jobless in the long run.