KUALA LUMPUR – The Social Security Organisation (Socso) will amend its act to allow disbursement of grants equivalent to 80% of the insured salary value of workers to encourage women to get back into the workforce after long maternity or parental leave, said Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim.
Anwar said it is estimated that more than 130,000 women who return to work after taking long maternity or parental leave will benefit from the grant, which involves an allocation of RM290 million a year.
Apart from that, he also called on employers to play a bigger role in preparing childcare centres or nurseries at their workplace.
“All this while childcare centres are provided by the government, so we have to monitor to ensure that big and rich companies also provide appropriate care centres for babies and children while their mothers work,” he said when tabling Budget 2023 in Parliament today.
Anwar said the government would also provide childcare centre subsidies of RM180 per month for civil servants, and increase the monthly household income eligibility limit from RM5,000 to RM7,000.
In order to expand access to early childhood education, he said the government would continue the construction of 80 nurseries and Kemas kindergartens, including 13 new projects.
A total of RM388.1 billion has been allocated under the revised Budget 2023, comprising RM289.1 billion for operating expenditure, and RM99 billion for development expenditure – including RM2 billion in contingency savings. – Bernama, February 24, 2023
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