Recent changes in legislation, affecting the still relatively new Rehabilitation Allowance in Hungary may affect hundreds of thousands of people across the country, yet they do not seem to successfully benefit the people whom they aim to help.
The rates of the previously applied Disability Allowance were purely based on medical reasons, yet the year 2010 brought confusion and frustration to many, with the introduction of the Rehabilitation Allowance. This new legislation was conceived in order to rehabilitate the disabled who qualify, by offering them the opportunity to work, in limited hours, while offering tax easing benefits to employers who offer jobs to people with disabilities.
Seems like a good idea? It may be so, the problem is in the handling.
As one lady effected by the changes explained:
She is not the only one feeling frustrated: “I searched the internet, yet the official site explaining the legislation is incredibly confusing. The lady, assigned to me to handle my case could not answer any of my questions. I don’t know what’s going to happen next”- explains a gentleman with a missing limb.
The centre of the confusion is the new regulations ‘tailored to the person’ approach. It does not only focus on the disability alone, as the previously applied Disability Allowance, but also the length of the patient’s employment history.
As the new regulations allow rehabilitation work wages based on these factors, their calculation is extremely important. How is this done? That’s a mystery. It is calculated within the internal system, while the rehabilitated has only one option: wait, and hope it will reach a living wage. The result hardly ever surpasses 80000 HUF (approx. £212). That arguably is not a living wage.
The calculation of course, is not the only confusing factor. Many people who qualified for rehabilitation, did not receive an invitation letter to the medical examinations that would give them the official green light to employment. Missing out on the examination results in automatic loss of the original Disability Allowance they had received, with a possibility to apply for another appointment. The waiting list is 6 to 9 months. During this, the patient does not receive any financial support regardless the severity of their disability.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1NNMz3eXSJM
One mother with a mild disability, who is the sole breadwinner of a small family, missed her examinations and was offered a new one in 7 months. ‘She can claim her allowance back later’- came her consolation. Her questions regarding her family`s living arrangements until then did not receive an answer.
Should the patient however, somehow manage to appear at their medical appointment, they face their next shock in the form of the also renewed medical examinations. In this case, there seems no sign of individual judgement. It involves a check list of a bonanza of missing body parts and disabling factors and none of the patient`s personal judgements are to be a factor in the decision process.
Would the rehabilitation allowance benefit the employers of the disabled? Let this question be answered by another. Would an employer choose a healthy candidate, or one who may be of risk of absence at any time, due to their illness? In a country devastated by financial instability and a daunting rate of unemployment, employers have choice, and they are unlikely to take the risk.
The government’s offer of tax benefits to employers, does not shrink the discouraging volume of lawful responsibilities to cater for their disabled employees. It is a devastating circle for people with disability, with potentially very serious results.
New changes in these legislations, active from 2014 may confuse the matter further, leaving employers and most importantly the people it mostly affects, in a legal cul-de-sac.
What are the solutions? Thorough, easy-to-understand information packages, rarely changing law and flexible medical appointments, that cater for the vulnerable people it is aimed at, are just the basis of a see through process. Medical examinations that treat patients like active agents are a necessity in a modern democratic country.
Currently Hungary, at least in this case is going astray, while attempts to mend the ravelling social net, appear more and more like attempts to produce meaningless statistics. It appears that until the governments attempts become less drastic, real democratic changes cannot be implemented.
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