Brazil aid is uncertain, transitory and harms the vulnerable, says Tatiana Roque

A “confusing heap of trinkets from other programs” with a “blatant electoral purpose”. This is how the vice president of the Brazilian Basic Income Network, Tatiana Roque, assesses the R$ 400 Brazilian Aid announced by the federal government as a replacement for Bolsa Família.

Proposed via a provisional measure, sent to the National Congress in August and which needs to be approved by the end of the year, Auxílio Brasil will replace the income transfer program established 18 years ago, which became a hallmark of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s governments (PT).

The Brazilian Network of Basic Income was created a little more than two years ago to broaden the debate on income transfer programs and has as its honorary president Eduardo Suplicy (PT) of São Paulo, the biggest propagator of universal basic income ideas. in national territory.

The group defends the institution of a minimum income for all Brazilian citizens, but defends Bolsa Família and planned its constitutionalization.

For Tatiana, Auxílio Brasil should not be treated as a successor to Bolsa Família due to factors such as legal and fiscal uncertainty, in addition to the adoption of a model that should impose difficulties in accessing the most vulnerable Brazilians.

From a legal point of view, the problem would lie in the institute of the provisional measure. “The MP is a fragile instrument for a program like this, besides leaving several points undefined.”

From a fiscal point of view, the measure depends on the approval of the PEC (proposed amendment to the Constitution) of the precatório, which will allow the dribble of the necessary spending ceiling so that the amount of R$ 400 is reached. The PEC should open a space of R$ 91.6 billion in the expenses of 2022, an election year, but it does not guarantee the continuity of the program in the following years.

Auxílio Brasil is President Jair Bolsonaro’s (non-party) bet to attract low-income voters in next year’s dispute. On the day of his announcement, the Minister of Citizenship, João Roma, declared: “We are structuring a transitional benefit, which would run until December of next year, and which would aim to equalize the benefit so that none of these families receive less than R$ 400”. With the extinction of Bolsa Família, therefore, it is not known what would be left for its beneficiaries after 2023.

According to Tatiana, the model chosen by the federal government still harms the most vulnerable Brazilians. “It’s okay to use the Caixa Econômica Federal application [como no caso do auxílio emergencial], but Auxílio Brasil goes over a humanized social assistance mechanism”, he says.

It refers to the CRAS (Reference Center for Social Assistance), which assist families in person, in the territories, helping to obtain documents and also recording important information for other public policies.

“Very poor people have a problem with citizenship. And when everything is computerized, it becomes that despair because many people do not have the internet to use a digital service”, says she, who is a mathematician and a professor at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro.

“Furthermore, Bolsa Família did an active search, that is, it did not wait for the family to queue up for the program, but sought the people who needed the benefit where they were. This had already stopped since the spending ceiling was created. With Auxílio Brasil, should disappear.”

“Bolsa Família is an award-winning and perennial program, simple and well designed, easy to understand and impact analysis”, she points out. “It would need to be expanded and include the queue of people who were waiting for the benefit due to delays by the Temer and Bolsonaro governments. And it would have to increase the value of the benefit, which is very outdated.”

Today, the average benefit of Bolsa Família is R$189. And Tatiana’s only point of agreement with Auxílio Brasil is in relation to the proposed amount. “I think R$400 is ideal, but it had to be paid by Bolsa Família. Its extinction is an unreasonable and evidently electoral measure. It is obscene,” he says.