House, govt amend social security bill

Ridwan Max Sijabat, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The House of Representatives and the government have made substantial changes to the much-criticized bill on national social security, which was due to be endorsed on Wednesday.

The House special committee and the manpower minister, in the final minutes of their Monday meeting, agreed not to liquidate state-owned PT Jamsostek, PT Taspen, PT Askes, PT Jasa Raharja and PT Asabri, which provide social security to workers, civil servants, servicemen and public transport passengers, respectively.

"The legislation will function as an umbrella law for all laws that regulate state-owned social security firms and their existing programs," special committee chairman Surya Chandra Surapaty told the press after the committee's last session.

The House is scheduled to hold a plenary session on Tuesday to endorse the bill, which sparked opposition from employers and labor unions alike. They challenged the draft as it proposed that workers insurance firm Jamsostek be merged with the other four and provide cross-subsidized social security to the unemployed and the poor.

Djimanto, secretary-general of the Indonesian Employers Association (Apindo), hailed the amendments to the bill, saying Apindo would accept the bill as long as it did not overburden employers and workers.

House special committee member Rekso Ageng Herman said the government and the committee also agreed to insert a special article on the establishment of a non-profit agency that falls directly under the President, tasked with managing trust funds for the social security programs.

"The five companies will no longer be obliged to pay taxes and dividends to the government, and their annual profits will be added to their assets to help improve subscribers' welfare," he said.

The bill also stipulates that the government is to cover the membership of the jobless in social security programs, which will be carried out in phases.

"In the first phase, the government will provide health care for the unemployed, with their premiums to be drawn from the annual state budget," Rekso said, adding that finance minister Boediono had guaranteed that the state would pay the social security premiums for unemployed people.

Under the draft bill, the government is also to issue a regulation that defines the unemployed category, as many people who work less than 35 hours per week or make a monthly income below the subsistence level -- or disguised unemployment -- are included in the open unemployment category.

Muzni Tambusai, director general for labor standards at the Ministry of Manpower and Transmigration, told The Jakarta Post single unemployed people would be charged a health care premium equivalent to 3 percent of regional minimum wages, while married unemployed people would be charged 6 percent, and their health care benefits would be regulated by government legislation.

B.M. Tri Lestari, Jamsostek director of planning, development and information, lauded the changes to the bill, as employers and workers considered the previously proposed merger unfair: Jamsostek had Rp 33 trillion in assets collected from workers and their employers, while social security for civil servants and servicemen were covered by the government.