A Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmaker yesterday said the latest version of the National Health Insurance (NHI) reform plan, presented by the Department of Health (DOH) to the legislature on Thursday, was “unfair,” as it failed to cap supplementary earnings and did not include pension funds and rent income as part of its income calculations.
“The rates are a mess right now and the [proposal] is broadly unfair,” DPP Legislator Huang Sue-ying (黃淑英) said.
Huang said the new supplementary earning category, which includes financial gain from stocks, interest, some bonuses and other reward-based compensation, had not been well thought out, since it failed to include an income cap.
“It amounts to a blank check,” she said. “This will create even greater inequality for the National Health Insurance system.”
Meanwhile, she said it wasn’t right to leave funds acquired from pension plans and privately held rental income out of the supplementary income category, which is subject to a 2 percent rate.
The decision, which would have affected hundreds of thousands of public sector workers and retirees, was deliberately left out because of political considerations, Huang said, adding that the substantial differences in rates paid by employees and self-employed business owners were part of the same ploy.
Citing as an example the rates paid by lawyers and business managers, she said that even if both received the same salary of about NT$200,000 a month, lawyers would be paying about NT$7,000 more per month because of the -different rates that business owners are subject to.
“The new proposal is not based on a principle of fairness,” she added. “The Executive Yuan should first issue an impact assessment and then hold hearings to gather a public consensus.”
However, KMT Legislator Lo Shu-lei (羅淑蕾) rebutted Huang’s criticism, saying the proposal was more feasible than a previous version that had been proposed.
An initial version of a reformed NHI plan proposed by the KMT caucus failed to pass a second and third reading in the legislature on Dec. 7, forcing Department of Health Minister Yaung Chih-liang (楊志良) to propose a new version, which he submitted to the -legislature on Thursday.
Asked for comment, Lo said the new proposal was expected to help lower the insurance fees of the economically disadvantaged, adding that the KMT caucus had agreed to support the new bill.
Meanwhile, Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) said he expected the proposal to be put to a second and third reading on Friday at the latest.
Wang is scheduled to invite legislators from across party lines to negotiate the new proposal today.
However, he said the legislature might as well deal with the central government’s fiscal budget request for next year first if lawmakers do not see eye to eye on the NHI bill.
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY FLORA WANG AND STAFF WRITER
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