Local mobilization for the take-up of social benefits and services
Résumé
This study will investigate how Member States are introducing reforms to ensure that monetary social benefits reach those most in need, and, in the face of restricted budgets, how effective the implementation of these reforms is. The first part of the study will identify and describe gaps between eligibility and take-up of various monetary social benefits, the groups most effected by non-take-up, and the main barriers to accessing benefits. The second part will explore how welfare systems and initiatives by governments and NGOs have promoted effective take-up of benefits and describes the experiences of providers and beneficiaries.
The importance of the topic is highlighted by the European Commission’s Social Investment Package (SIP), which calls for each MS to invest more in the proper design, implementation and assessment of social policies. Measures can be compensatory or preventative and may seek to improve take-up through changing the system and delivery, or by improving beneficiaries’ individual capabilities in accessing benefits.
The study will document the efficiency as well as the effectiveness of four recent measures to improve the take-up of monetary benefits for vulnerable groups. In particular, it will describe at least one recent initiative that aimed to remove inefficiencies by simplifying claim procedures and at least one other measure that effectively improved access to benefits and the actual take-up of benefits (where the focus may be less on efficiency).
Lot 3 covers 15 countries (Austria, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Estonia, France, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Slovakia, Slovenia) that are in a middle position in terms of benefit recipiency rates and benefit amounts between “elitist” Southern Member States and “universalist” Nordic states, according to Oorschot (2013). The impact of the welfare system on poverty (measured as the percentage reduction in the poverty rate when comparing poverty before and after transfers) shows considerable variation across these countries (Table 1). The Southern and the Baltic states within the group tend to perform poorly (similarly to Spain or Romania), while Austria, France, Ireland and the Visegrad countries are relatively effective in reducing poverty (similarly to Denmark or Sweden).