《TAIPEI TIMES》 Funding approved to raise caretakers’ wages

ADDITIONAL SOCIAL WORKERS: The funding is to resolve the issue of insufficient services for the physically or mentally challenged and provide them with better care

By Chung Li-hua and Jake Chung / Staff reporter, with staff writer

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The Executive Yuan yesterday approved funding for a NT$48 billion Ministry of Health and Welfare five-year project to increase the pay of educators and carers for physically and mentally challenged people to NT$37,700 and NT$33,700 respectively.

The base pay for carers is NT$26,000 to NT$30,000, while educators have a base pay of NT$30,000 to NT$34,000.

There are 1.2 million people registered as physically or mentally challenged in the nation, ministry data show, but despite the government’s best efforts, there are insufficient personnel to care for existing patients, much less to find potential people in need.

The ministry said the funding would hopefully resolve the issue of insufficient services for physically or mentally challenged people and provide them with better care.

The project — which involves the health ministry, the Ministry of the Interior, the Ministry of Justice and local governments — aims to alleviate the burden of families with such people, to expand community services, to boost and increase the diversity of facilities to provide services, and to help retain talent by offering better incentives and work environments, the health ministry said.

The project is to hire an additional 1,355 social workers, and increase the number of communal and daycare facilities so that they can care for 14,572 people, it said.

The health ministry said it would convene meetings with local governments as soon as possible to brief them on the details.

Minister of Health and Welfare Lee Li-fen （李麗芬） said the project’s priority is to increase the resources available for communal and at-home care services.

She said the project hopes to satisfy all the care needs of physically and mentally challenged people within five years.

The project would work with local authorities to establish county or city-specific centers that would dispatch social workers to assess, plan and provide services for families in need instead of being a passive, on-request service, she added.

Premier Chen Chien-jen （陳建仁） told at an Executive Yuan meeting that the project should work with local governments to provide better, diversified services for those in need, Executive Yuan spokesman Lin Tzu-lun （林子倫） said.

The premier said that the ministries should begin discussions with local governments on implementing the project and set up monitoring measures to enforce its implementation.

新聞來源：TAIPEI TIMES