Notice of the Ministry of Civil Affairs and the Ministry of Finance on effectively ensuring the basic livelihood of people in need

All provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities directly under the central government, the Civil Affairs Department (bureau) and the Finance Department (bureau), the Civil Affairs Bureau and the Finance Bureau of the cities under separate state planning, and the Civil Affairs Bureau and the Finance Bureau of Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps:

At present, the epidemic situation in COVID-19 is frequent, and a large-scale epidemic situation has occurred in some places, which has affected the lives of people in need. In order to thoroughly implement the spirit of the important instructions of the Supreme Leader General Secretary on epidemic prevention and control and basic livelihood security, fully implement the relevant requirements of the CPC Central Committee and the State Council on solidly stabilizing the economy and improving the social and livelihood security measures, and effectively guarantee the basic livelihood of the people in urban and rural areas, the relevant matters are hereby notified as follows:

First, do a solid job in basic living assistance such as subsistence allowances.

Intensify the implementation of the subsistence allowance system, and timely include families with difficulties in living that meet the subsistence allowance conditions into the subsistence allowance scope. One-time living allowance will be issued for the minimum living allowances and poor people, and one-time temporary relief funds can be issued for people with temporary living difficulties in areas seriously affected by the epidemic. Actively promote the employment of relief workers with working conditions, and give a certain gradual retirement period to families whose income exceeds the minimum living standard due to the employment of family members. Pay close attention to price changes, promptly start the linkage mechanism linking social assistance and security standards with price increases, and pay temporary price subsidies in full and on time.

Two, increase the uninsured unemployed and other difficult people temporary relief efforts.

Strengthen assistance to unemployed people who have no source of income and have not participated in unemployment insurance. In accordance with the requirements of the Notice of the Ministry of Civil Affairs and the Ministry of Finance on Further Improving the Basic Living Security for People in Difficulties (Minfa [2020] No.69), those uninsured unemployed workers, such as migrant workers, who have been unable to return to work due to the epidemic, have no source of income for three consecutive months, have difficulties in living and are not covered by the unemployment insurance policy, are not included in the minimum living security, and upon their own application, they will be given a one-time temporary relief fund from their place of work or their habitual residence to help them tide over their difficulties. We will increase assistance to unemployed college students and other young people who have difficulties in life, and take corresponding measures such as temporary assistance in a timely manner according to the actual situation. For low-income people, destitute people and COVID-19 patients among the poverty-stricken population, and families with temporary difficulties in basic life due to the isolation of family members, temporary assistance will be given directly according to needs. For other families or individuals whose basic lives are affected by the epidemic and are in trouble, the relevant social assistance and security system can’t cover them for the time being, and timely help them through temporary assistance.

Third, strengthen thorough investigation and active discovery

Local civil affairs departments should strengthen the construction of active discovery mechanism, organize and mobilize grassroots cadres, village-level organizations, social assistance assistants, social workers, etc., and comprehensively understand the living conditions of people in difficulty affected by the epidemic in their respective jurisdictions through visits, telephone communication, and WeChat contact, focusing on unemployed people, flexible employees, marginal people with minimal assurance, monitoring objects to prevent poverty, people who do not meet the minimum assurance conditions temporarily but have certain difficulties, and people in difficulty who still lack their own development ability after assistance, and timely discover assistance. Make full use of the dynamic monitoring information platform of low-income population, strengthen information sharing and data comparison and analysis with relevant departments, strengthen monitoring and early warning of low-income population, and timely intervene, accurately rescue and comprehensively help people in need. Further unblock the channels of consultation and help for people in need, such as the social assistance service hotline, strengthen the hotline duty, improve the handling efficiency, and achieve timely acceptance and rapid response.

Four, to further improve the accessibility and timeliness of relief.

All localities should strengthen the connection of the relief work such as subsistence allowances, assistance and support for extremely poor people, and temporary assistance, and make overall use of various relief policies and measures to ensure that all should be guaranteed and all should be saved. Comprehensive consideration of the actual situation of the people affected by the epidemic, the full implementation of the "first aid", "grading approval" and other policies and regulations, reasonable setting of township (street) approval quota, appropriate increase in high-risk areas township (street) reserve fund allocation quota and approval quota, serious epidemic areas can be directly implemented by the community (village) temporary relief. Combined with the actual situation, it is clear about the specific circumstances, standards and time limit of temporary assistance for foreigners who are temporarily in trouble. For people who are in trouble because of the epidemic in non-registered places, temporary assistance will be directly implemented from the place where the emergency occurred. Give full play to the role of the coordination mechanism of the basic living security work of the people in need at the county level, and make overall plans to integrate the relief resources. For those who encounter major living difficulties, the methods of "one case, one discussion" and "one case, one policy" can be adopted to improve the level of relief and solve urgent cases. Simplify and optimize the rescue procedures, actively apply information technology such as "internet plus" and mobile APP, and gradually implement online handling of the whole process of social assistance to reduce crowd gathering, reduce infection risk and improve handling efficiency.

Five, optimize and improve the rescue service mode

All localities should implement classified and differentiated assistance according to the actual needs of the people in need, and make overall use of ways such as distributing goods, cash and providing services to provide accurate assistance. During the period of epidemic prevention and control, we should actively help people in distress to do personal protection and properly solve the problems of dining and accommodation for foreign stranded personnel. Strengthen decentralized support for poor people to visit and care for them, and urge the care service personnel to earnestly fulfill the entrusted care service agreement and take good care of the daily life of the poor people. Encourage and support charitable organizations, volunteers, professional social workers and other social forces to actively participate in social assistance, and provide diversified services such as material donation, life care, psychological counseling and medical care for people in need. Improve and implement policies and measures to support social forces to participate in social assistance, and increase the government’s efforts to purchase services. Encourage and guide charitable organizations to set up social assistance projects, explore the establishment of a "emergency rescue" platform with government guidance and support, industry organization operation and charitable organizations’ participation, and further strengthen the effective connection between government assistance and charitable assistance.

Sixth, strengthen supervision and management

All localities should strengthen supervision and inspection of social assistance work to ensure the implementation of various policies and measures. In strict accordance with the relevant provisions of fund management, further clarify the use of relief funds for people in need, standardize the scope of use and distribution methods, strengthen fund supervision, and strictly prohibit unauthorized expansion of the scope of fund expenditure, and prohibit any form of misappropriation, misappropriation, interception or detention of relief funds to improve the efficiency of fund use. We will comprehensively rectify the problems found in the audit of relief subsidy funds for people in need, carry out in-depth comprehensive management of corruption and work style problems around the people in the field of social assistance, and seriously investigate and deal with violations such as false reporting, interception of private parts, embezzlement and embezzlement of relief funds, and "relationship protection", "human protection" and eating cards. While strengthening internal supervision, we will consciously accept the supervision of discipline inspection and supervision, auditing and other departments, give full play to the role of social supervision, find problems in time and plug loopholes in fund supervision, strengthen risk prevention and control, and ensure the accurate use of funds. Establish and improve the fault-tolerant and error-correcting mechanism to encourage party member cadres to take responsibility.

Seven, strengthen organizational security.

All localities should fully understand the extreme importance and urgency of doing a good job in ensuring the basic livelihood of the people in need, effectively improve their political stance, enhance their awareness of the bottom line, adhere to the people-centered development thinking, focus on the urgent problems of the people in need, and earnestly grasp the bottom line of ensuring the basic livelihood of the people in need. It is necessary to strengthen the guarantee of funds, make overall use of the central financial assistance subsidy funds and local financial arrangements at all levels, and give appropriate tilt to areas with serious epidemics to ensure that funds are issued in full and on time. Strengthen departmental coordination, policy convergence and resource pooling to form a joint rescue force. Strengthen policy propaganda and improve people’s awareness of aid policies. The implementation of social assistance policies in various places will be included in the performance evaluation of basic living assistance for people in need in 2022.

Ministry of Civil Affairs and Ministry of Finance
June 2, 2022