Rise in safety net benefit for some could be at cost of others

The government's decision to increase social security benefits for the long-term unemployed with two or more dependents will not involve an increase in the current budget for such spending, Deputy Prime Minister Soraya Sáenz de Santamaría said Wednesday.

Instead, she said the conditions of access to the subsistence payment will be tightened in order to ensure there is no overlap with benefits received from elsewhere. Beneficiaries could also face losing entitlement to the payment if they reject job offers or training courses proposed by the administration.

Labor Minister Fátima Báñez on Tuesday said the safety net payment for those no longer entitled to unemployment benefits with two dependents and a spouse also without a source of income will be increased to 450 euros a month from 399 at present.

As suggested last week by Carlos Floriano, a high-ranking official in the ruling Popular Party, this might mean that young people living at home with parents sufficiently well-off to take care of them might not be entitled to any payment at all.

The Cabinet is due to approve the increase in the safety payment at its regular Friday meeting as part of a reform and extension of the so-called Plan Prepara, which also aims to increase the employability of the long-term out-of-work by retraining them. However, Sáenz de Santamaría insisted that some of the details of the plan have yet to be decided, leaving the door open for surprises.