Hearing in the work and social committee

Today, the chairman of Løvemammaene, Bettina Lindgren, attended an oral hearing in the work and social committee regarding the state budget 2025. There she spoke primarily about the care allowance scheme, and concerns about the sharp increase in the number of care allowance recipients.

Bettina conveyed a need to look more closely at the connection between care money and municipal services, or rather the lack of them. Care money cannot be a cushion for municipal health authorities, nurseries and schools to fail to provide correct and/or sufficient services. This is something that we as an organization and legal aid measures are experiencing is a real problem in several municipalities today, and this particularly affects parents of children with involuntary absences from school or mental difficulties, but also parents who have very medically complex children where ordinary daycare and school services do not is justifiable. Because at the same time that we are rescuing more and more children who previously did not survive and who will now live everyday life in their home municipalities, there has also been an explosive increase in children and young people who receive diagnoses such as anxiety, ADHD and autism, the latter of which has had an increase of 400 % in the last decade, and this is again a group of children who are overrepresented among those with involuntary school absences, and thus parents on care allowance.

Bettina said, among other things:

Don't get me wrong, the care allowance scheme is fantastic. It ensures income for parents when life is at a standstill. But it has never been intended as a rest cushion for the municipalities, nor an "option". Because care money is not something you choose, it is something you do MUST ha, because the child is so ill that he is admitted to hospital, or because the child is about to die, or because he has such a great need for care and supervision that work becomes impossible for a period of time. Care allowance is the last resort when nothing else works or can be solved, but our experience is that the attitude "the parents are on care allowance anyway, so it's not that dangerous" is something you hear frighteningly often.

The aim of an extension of the childcare allowance scheme was never as many parents as possible on childcare allowance, or that childcare allowance should be the solution in the many families where children require a lot of extra.

The aim must be for parents to receive enough support and relief, so that the majority of them are able to work in full or in part. And the solution lies primarily in the specialist health service and in the municipalities. But then the politicians in the Storting must talk together across committees and parties, because the number of parents on care allowance will only continue to increase as long as a state budget is delivered that is so tight that municipalities are unable to deliver good statutory services and other necessary offers, and in the worst case ends up on Robek. The queues in the health care system, especially child and youth psychiatry, must be reduced. More children and young people must receive BPA. etc. And then there needs to be money on the table.

You can watch the oral hearing on "Løvemammaenes kamp" on Facebook.

Below you can read the entire written consultation input we submitted to the committee in connection with the consultation, where we also mention both basic and auxiliary allowance, aids and pensions.

Hearing input for prop. 1 S (2024-2025) from Løvemammaene 

Expenditure chapter: 600–672, 2470, 2541–2542, 2620–2686 Income chapter: 3605–3672, 5470, 5701–5705

Basic and auxiliary allowance 

In the period 2013-2013, the average salary increase was 26 %, while compensation for private care for children with illness and/or functional variation has only increased by 6 %. This means that the average wage increase per year in the period was 2.8 %, and the "increase" for private care was only 0.66 % per year. In reality, there has been a decline in basic and welfare benefits compared to other economic developments in society in all years. And this tells us only one thing, namely that the efforts made by relatives' guardians have no value. If you compare it with the cash allowance, a scheme primarily for parents of healthy children who just want to keep their children at home a little longer than the parental leave allows, the percentage increase is quite different. In 2017, the cash support scheme increased by a full 50 %, paradoxically enough. There are huge differences!  

The Løvemammaen are concerned that the necessary allowances in the welfare service are in line with society's development, that the rates have a regular increase. We believe that the government must ensure a sharp increase in the rates for both basic and auxiliary allowance in 2025 and beyond in the years to come, so that the allowances to a greater extent moderate price and wage growth over the past 10 years. Basic and auxiliary benefits are benefit schemes that should have an annual upward adjustment of the rates in line with social development.  

Aids 

Many have to wait far too long for aids that they depend on on a daily basis. Without the necessary aids, one is isolated and excluded. It is positive that the government chooses to increase the allocation to the Norwegian Labor and Welfare Agency to ensure that the level of reuse at the aid centers is maintained. We support reuse - it both makes sense economically and leads to shorter waiting times for aids. The lion mothers think it is good to see that the government is also taking action to shorten the delivery time for specially adapted box vans, which is currently around 2 years. There are far too many children and young people who do not get to participate in activities with family and friends due to the disproportionately long delivery time. Even if it is decided that the Norwegian Labor and Welfare Agency will order in advance based on a standardized set-up, it is positive that the government recognizes that not everyone has the same needs. It is therefore very important that you have made it clear that users can make individual adjustments where there is a need for it. 

Pension 

Parents can be credited with pension points for years with major care tasks, and the care accrual guarantees that the parents will receive a pension accrual that corresponds to an income of 4.5 G. The problem arises if the parent is able to work part-time alongside the care tasks. If you work in two part-time positions in your working life, it goes without saying that pension points are calculated for both positions. Parents who, despite extensive care duties, have managed to maintain contact with working life in a part-time position, experience the opposite. If parents' work has been reduced with a salary of less than 4.5 G, they lose all pension points for their work income. In reality, the parents have had two jobs, but therefore only receive pension points for one. If the wage income is over 4.5 G, then you lose the pension points for the care work. In terms of pensions, it therefore does not pay to work.  

Parents who have children with a long-term illness or extensive disability often have very large care tasks over many years. The extensive care tasks often force one of the parents to either give up their own career entirely, or to work in a reduced position over many years, and hence lower wages and fewer career opportunities. This is not a choice the parents have, but something the situation requires. Løvemammaene believes that the Labor and Social Committee (and the Ministry of Labor and Inclusion) must ensure that parents with particularly onerous care tasks, who receive pension points for care work, must also be able to earn pension points from paid part-time work, on the same level as other employees. It must be a matter of course that parents who succeed in working part-time receive pension points for the care work in addition to a pension from their wage income, not instead. 

Caring allowance 

There is a need to look at the connection between care money and the lack of municipal services. Care money cannot be a cushion for municipal health authorities, nurseries and schools to fail to provide correct and/or sufficient services. This is something we experience to be a real problem in several municipalities today, and this particularly affects parents of children with involuntary school absences, mental difficulties, etc. 

Care allowance after the child's death 

If a child dies, you will receive care allowance for three months after the death if you have previously received care allowance continuously for more than three years. If you have received care allowance for less than three years before the death, or if you have been able to partially work, you will receive care allowance for six weeks after the death. So it pays off if you manage to work. This practice is also unreasonable discrimination, simply grief discrimination. Losing a child is unbearably painful, regardless of how long you have received care allowance. We believe that all parents on care allowance should keep this for at least three months after a death. 

Caring allowance must give the right to unemployment benefit 

In the National Insurance Act § 4-4 Minimum income requirements, care allowance is not equated with income from work and thus does not give the right to unemployment benefit. This is actually quite strange, all the while care money is equated with income from work in several chapters of the National Insurance Act, e.g. in chapter 8 on sickness benefits and chapter 14 on parental benefits. Unfortunately, it happens that people lose their jobs for various reasons, or that a temporary job is not renewed during the period they receive care allowance. When the care allowance period is over and you have to go back into the labor market, you have no income. This appears very unfair to people who have been completely out of work for a period of time due to children with chronic illness and disability. The only alternative for these parents will then be to use any savings, or receive social assistance until they find a new job. 

Financial support scheme for people outside the working world 

The Storting made the following request decision in 2017:  

Changes to the care allowance scheme. Resolution No. 1, 11 October 2017. 
"The Storting is asking the government to put forward proposals for changes to the care allowance scheme that will ensure more financial security and predictability for parents with caregiving tasks." 

This request decision does not seem to have been followed up. Løvemammaene believes that students, AAP recipients and others who are temporarily out of work for various reasons must be guaranteed financial support when they have a sick/disabled child. How this is to be resolved should be investigated. We believe that this must be a separate support scheme, and not part of the care allowance scheme, as it will undermine one of the main conditions for the right to care allowance, that one must have lost pensionable income. 

With best regards 
The lion mothers