THE government is in the midst of drafting the national social protection policy that is in line with the Shared Prosperity Vision 2030.

The policy will encompass all aspects of prevention, protection, promotion and transformation, said a statement from the Deputy Prime Minister’s Office in conjunction with the first meeting of the Malaysian Social Protection Council (MySPC) chaired by Dr Wan Azizah Dr Wan Ismail today.

MySPC is the main coordinating body for policies and programmes to boost the social protection system.

The statement said, through MySPC, the existing and new social protection programmes would also be rationalised.

“This is to ensure optimal utilisation of financial resources and efficient distribution of assistance or incentives to bring impact to targeted groups,” it said.

It said the government had allocated RM22.27 billion this year to implement more than 120 social aid programmes involving 21 government agencies.

On today’s meeting, it said four committees that had been set up would be led by relevant ministries and departments.

The Women, Family and Community Development Ministry will lead the Social Aid Working Committee, which is responsible for rationalising and strengthening social aid programmes.

“Coordination will involve all programmes and activities related to social aid programmes by various ministries and agencies. The target groups will include those in the B40 group especially among the poor and hardcore poor categories,” the statement said.

The Social Insurance Working Committee, led by the Finance Ministry, will oversee the reform of social insurance framework, pensions and retirement with protection schemes under the Social Security Organisation (Socso) and the Employees Provident Fund (EPF) to be improved and expanded to all Malaysians.

The Labour Market Intervention Committee, led by the Human Resources Ministry, targets the active and inclusive labour market by increasing participation and maintaining the target groups in the labour market.

“It will be implemented through interventions on job placement, skills upgrading and retraining, minimum wage and re-employment of pensioners or senior citizens,” it said.

The Statistics Department will lead the Data Management Working Committee on the development of the National Social Protection System.

“The system will store and manage all social protection data across agencies that will be used in social protection programmes,” the statement said.

It said in the first six months of its implementation, the data of aid recipients would be collected and validated pending completion of the new system which would incorporate data from EPF, Socso, Inland Revenue Board, Social Welfare Department, Road Transport Department and National Registration Department. – Bernama, December 12, 2019.