Consulting on policy development for female workers
At the workshop, Ms. Do Hong Van - Member of the Presidium, Head of the Women's Committee of the Vietnam General Confederation of Labor - said that trade unions at all levels have actively researched, consulted on the development, inspection and supervision of legal policies on female workers such as piloting the construction of kindergartens for workers' children; participating in policies on labor, social insurance, maternity; nursery and kindergarten issues; participating in dialogue and negotiation to include in collective labor agreements many policies that are more beneficial to female workers, including negotiating childcare support for workers' children...
According to the Head of the Women's Committee of the Vietnam General Confederation of Labor, in recent years, at annual meetings with the Prime Minister, the Vietnam General Confederation of Labor has proposed policies on kindergartens for workers' children, which have received attention, strong direction and concrete policies that are increasingly practical for workers.
Union support
Reporting at the workshop, a representative of the Binh Duong Provincial Federation of Labor said that the Provincial Federation of Labor has issued a number of propaganda and guidance documents for beneficiaries of policies under Decree No. 105/2020/ND-CP, specified in Resolution No. 09/2021/NQ-HDND, to complete documents and papers according to regulations to enjoy support levels.
The Binh Duong Provincial Federation of Labor has directed trade unions at all levels to effectively implement legal regulations on regimes and policies directly related to the rights of workers, especially policies to support female workers raising young children; policies to support universal health insurance for families of female workers in difficult circumstances, allowing women with children under 36 months old to take 60 minutes off work each day to have time to take care of their young children and women with children returning to work after giving birth are supported with a portion of the cost of raising young children until the child is 6 years old; some enterprises support part of the cost for workers to send their children to daycare, kindergarten, and to raise children at all levels of education with a support level of 50,000 - 200,000 VND/child/month...
After nearly 4 years of implementing Decrees 145 and 105, including nearly 2 years in the context of COVID-19, some key results have been achieved: Regarding the implementation of Decree 105: Currently, 50 provinces have issued People's Council Resolutions detailing the subsidy levels for children of workers.
Most provinces implement the minimum level stipulated in the Decree of 160,000 VND/child/month. Provinces with higher support levels are: Binh Dinh (300,000 VND/child/month); Hanoi, Quang Ninh, Ba Ria - Vung Tau (240,000 VND/child/month); Vinh Phuc (220,000 VND/child/month); Hai Phong, Da Nang (200,000 VND/child/month).
According to reports from localities, in the 2022-2023 school year, nearly 150,000 children nationwide are eligible for subsidies. To date, provinces/cities have paid nearly 160 billion VND.
Regarding the implementation of Decree 145: The State has had many policies to care for children of workers, regardless of whether they are children of workers in or outside industrial zones. However, the implementation of the provisions of this Decree into life has not kept up with the needs of reality. In particular, it can be mentioned that the rapid increase of industrial parks, clusters, export processing zones and the labor force has created pressure on housing, health care and education. The planning and development of the public school network in places with industrial parks, clusters and export processing zones is not synchronous, not meeting the needs of workers.
