3.8 million seniors to get P23 billion allowance

MANILA, Philippines — Some 3.8 million senior citizens will receive a monthly allowance of P500 – or a total of P23.18 billion – from the government next year, Makati Rep. Luis Campos Jr. said yesterday.

He said the number of beneficiaries represents an increase of 800,000 from this year’s three million recipients.

“We want the monthly stipend for poverty-stricken seniors bumped up to P2,000, considering that Congress has not increased the original P500 since 2010,” Campos, an appropriations committee member and a deputy minority leader, said.

“Congress has to move quickly in raising the pocket money for hard-up seniors who are now extremely vulnerable to hunger due to runaway food price inflation,” he added.

He pointed out that under the Expanded Senior Citizens Law of 2010 that pegs the monthly grant for indigent seniors at P500, Congress was supposed to but never reviewed the amount every two years for a possible increase. 

“If government cannot afford to provide P2,000 monthly to every indigent senior all at once, we should at least offer the amount to those who are 70 years old and above,” he said.

Campos has authored Bill 2653, which seeks to jack up to P2,000 the monthly pension for destitute seniors at least 70 years old.

In batting for the increase, the Makati lawmaker invoked the mandate of the 1987 Constitution for the state “to care for the elderly through just programs of social security and to provide improved quality of life for all.”

“An allowance of P2,000 per month, or P24,000 per annum, would serve as a bigger helping hand to needy seniors at least 70 years old and who have absolutely no one else to turn to for financial aid,” he said.

Under the law, indigent seniors refer to citizens 60 years old and above who do not receive any regular pension from elsewhere, lack permanent income or compensation or regular and appropriate financial support from family members; and are listed as qualified beneficiaries by the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD).

The DSWD is required to ensure that the P500 monthly stipend is given directly to payees.

The department is permitted to spend only up to seven percent of the funding allocation for administrative expenses.