The approval by the Council of Ministers of a new Plan for the Benefit for Pensioners with Low Incomes, with simplified procedures, was announced on Wednesday by the Deputy Minister of Social Welfare, Anastasia Anthousi.
Regarding the new Plan for the Support Allowance for Pensioners with Low Incomes, which was approved on the proposal of the Deputy Minister of Social Welfare, and which will be implemented from 1 January 2023, Ms. Anthousi said that the procedures and the way of submitting applications are significantly simplified, the timeframes for examining applications are reduced, while at the same time the safeguards for granting the Allowance are maintained.
In addition, according to her, the application for Low Pensioner's Allowance is decoupled from the obligation to submit a parallel application for the Minimum Guaranteed Income (MGA), a process which required time for assessment, and thus the process of examining actual MGA applicants is relieved.
In her remarks after the Cabinet meeting, Anthousi described the new Scheme as "important" since, she said, all low-income pensioners without exception are now given the right to apply for participation in the Scheme.
As had become apparent, she added, some of the low pensioners under the existing framework, who were receiving Low Pensioner's Allowance before 2014, had not taken advantage of the extension granted by the Government which expired in 2020 and therefore could not be assessed for the Low Pensioner's Allowance despite the fact that they may have fallen within the provisions of the Scheme.
"The Plan now completes the arrangement to support low pensioners and corrects the minor weaknesses that existed until now and implements the Government's decision that no low pensioner will receive less than €710 for single households and €1.210 for a low pensioner couple", the Deputy Minister of Social Welfare noted.
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