New social insurance scheme nears

The new law which was passed by the National Assembly last November will replace the current Law on Social Insurance 2006 as part of an effort to ensure the rights and welfare of employees, organizations and individuals participating in social insurance.

The law will broaden the coverage of the social insurance to boost the number of social insurance participants. This will include short-term or seasonal workers with labour contracts of one to three months and voluntary social insurance participants.

In addition, gender equality is also incorporated into the provisions of the new law to ensure better welfare entitlements during maternity leave for both male and female employees and an adjusted pension calculation method for female employees intended to lessen the pension disparity between male and female employees.

During a workshop on March 12 which focused on ensuring social security through the implementation of the Law on Social Insurance held by the National Assembly Committee for Social Affairs in conjunction with the Ministry of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs (MOLISA) and the Vietnam Social Security (VSS), issues related to the law were discussed.

MOLISA Deputy Minister Pham Minh Huan stressed that the biggest challenge in expanding the scope of social insurance was low awareness among the public, with many people unaware of their entitlements. Huan argued that public awareness on the issue needed to be dramatically raised through better government promotional campaigns.

“Changes to the regulations on social insurance will have a direct impact on the rights and benefits of employees and in turn this will affect the costs of production, sales and profitability of businesses. Therefore, prior to the date of application of the new regulations, both employees and employers need to be thoroughly informed of the changes,” Huan emphasized.

Pham Do Nhat Tan, former director of the Department of Social Security under the MOLISA agreed, stating that the contents of the changes must be communicated in a concise and forthright way.

Tan then suggested that “the total reform of human resources across the sector is crucial to the development of the social insurance system, everyone will need to reassess the way they work in regards to social insurance and welfare, and the improvement in administration procedures and IT will mean the system can start moving towards embracing international standards.”

According to VSS deputy general director Do Van Sinh, to effectively implement the law, Vietnam could enhance and develop an IT system for the social insurance sector specifically to manage its operation and services.

“In the run-up to 2020, we want to see at least 50% of the workforce benefiting from the social insurance programme, equivalent to 28 million workers, including through voluntary and compulsory social insurance. However, to make this a reality, every step of the preparations need to be carried out to make the implementation of the new law a success,” added Sinh.