Revised laws aim for wider insurance coverage

The revised laws on Social Insurance and Health Insurance will ensure fairer and better enforcement of labourers’ rights, according to Vice Chairman of the National Assembly’s Committee on Social Affairs Bui Si Loi. 

Loi made the affirmation at a workshop on strengthening the enforcement of the two laws in the public sector held in HCM City on December 11. 

Among new regulations of great public interests in the two laws there is the stipulation that labourers working under contracts of one to three months will have to join compulsory social insurance beginning from 2018. 

Foreign workers who have working permissions or certificates of professional practices issued by Vietnamese authorised agencies, can also join the obligatory social insurance. 

At the same time, voluntary social insurance will be expanded to cover more groups in society with assistance from the government and flexible payment methods, Loi said. 

Participants agreed that administrations of all levels and relevant agencies need to work closely in organising awareness communication campaigns on the importance of social and health insurance along with improving the quality of health services and reforming administrative procedures to implement the two laws better. 

According to the Vietnam Social Insurance’s report, as of the third quarter of 2015, the country has 67.4 million people taking part in health insurance or 73.9 percent of the population, while only 0.5 percent of the workforce have joined voluntary social insurance.