Radio | News week in plain Finnish | Sunday 17.8.2025

Social assistance reform

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Social assistance reform

The topic of the news week is the reform of social assistance.

The government wants to change social assistance so that people apply for other benefits rather than social assistance.

The goal is to encourage people to look for work and reduce the number of people living solely on social assistance.

The bill has received a lot of criticism.

We will now tell you more about the social assistance bill and its criticism.

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Social assistance is applied for from Kela. Photo: Jari Kovalainen / Yle

Big change

The bill on social assistance is currently being circulated for comments. A lot of feedback has been given.

Many people say the goal is good, but the bill raises concerns.

The biggest change is that the recipient of the support must, for example, apply for full-time employment.

If you do not do this, your social assistance may be cut by up to 50 percent.

This also applies to those who work part-time, study without financial aid, or are entrepreneurs if the business is not profitable.

Disability

In the future, social assistance may also be cut if a person has a medical certificate of incapacity for work, but does not receive sickness allowance or disability pension.

This issue has received a lot of criticism.

Many fear that the reform will make the lives of vulnerable people much more difficult.


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In the future, more and more Finns will have to apply for full-time work in order to receive support. Photo: Jorge González / Yle

Necessary livelihood

Kela and other authorities remind us that the Constitution guarantees all Finns a basic income.

The bill does not contain specific instructions on how to ensure essential livelihoods if social assistance is cut.

The Chancellor of Justice and the Equality Ombudsman are also concerned that the instructions are not precise, leaving too much room for interpretation in the decisions.

Workload of municipalities and Kela

In the future, more and more Finns will have to register as job seekers to receive support.

This increases the workload of municipalities and Kela. Therefore, the costs of municipalities and welfare regions may increase.

Welfare regions fear that other subsidies and expenses will increase if social assistance is cut.

Repetition

The topic of the news week was the reform of social assistance and criticism of the reform.

The government wants to change social assistance so that people apply for other benefits rather than social assistance.

Kela, authorities, municipalities and welfare regions estimate that the change will cause many problems and increase costs.

The new law is scheduled to come into effect in February next year.

This was a news week in plain Finnish. See you again, let’s hear from you!