FGTS can be used to pay day care; see other measures

President Jair Bolsonaro (PL) announced this Wednesday (4) the easing of the rules for young apprentices and the release of FGTS resources (Fundo de Garantia por Tempo de Serviço) for women to pay for day care for their children or vocational courses, in an attempt to boost job creation in an election year.

The target audience of the measures is precisely Bolsonaro’s weak point in polls of voting intentions for the Presidency of the Republic: women and young people.

According to a Datafolha poll released at the end of March, 29% of the female electorate spontaneously say they will vote for former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT), leader in the polls, against 18% for Bolsonaro. In the previous survey, the margin was 30% to 14% for Lula.

An MP (provisional measure) signed by the president provides for the possibility for working mothers with children up to five years old to withdraw FGTS resources to pay for daycare expenses.

The money will not be available immediately: a resolution by the FGTS Board of Trustees will establish the number of installments, the amount of withdrawals and other rules.

The enrollment of children aged zero to three in day care centers is not mandatory, but the PNE (National Education Plan) law stipulates that, by 2024, half of the children in this age group will be in school.

report of Sheet last October, based on 2020 data, shows that not a third (31%) of children in this age group were in day care last year, which distanced the country from meeting the PNE target.

“We understand that, due to the volume of workers, the measure will not cover all the demand for federal daycare centers”, said the executive secretary of the Ministry of Labor and Social Security, Bruno Dalcolmo.

According to him, the release of the FGTS will be an additional option to the provision of daycare centers by the government. “But obviously the effort is quite big to increase the employability of women, and for that we need alternatives,” he said.

The government measure announced this Wednesday also allows workers to withdraw funds from the fund to invest in professional training, provided that they are within a list of courses to be stipulated by the government.

According to the Assistant Secretary for Labor, Tatiana Severino de Vasconcelos, the intention is to include courses related to engineering and innovation, areas that generally have higher salaries and are usually dominated by workers.

Government wants to encourage parents to leave work in the first year of a child’s life

The government MP also inserts in the law some incentive rules so that fathers can take time off work to help mothers in the first year of the child’s life. The adoption of these instruments will not be mandatory, but the government’s intention is to place them on the radar of collective bargaining between categories of workers and companies, disseminating their use.

The idea is to encourage male workers to negotiate flexibilities such as the use of a bank of hours, adoption of part-time work, anticipation of vacations, flexible entry and exit times.

Parents will also be able, in the first year of their child’s life, to opt for a temporary leave by taking a distance training course. The studies, however, must take place through recorded classes, not live. According to the technicians, the priority in this case is not the training of the worker, but the assistance to the mother.

The assistant secretary said that the focus on measurements in men is precisely to encourage a division of tasks in the domestic environment. Otherwise, adhesions would most likely occur among women, without greater sharing of responsibility for child care.

“It is the seed for a cultural change”, stated Vasconcelos. Nowadays, according to her, the possibility of adopting these measures already exists, but in practice they are not aimed at helping working mothers.

Women, in turn, will have the option to individually negotiate with the company a lay-off for an additional period, upon payment of a qualifying grant by the FAT (Fund for Support to the Worker).

The government will also make the Empresa Cidadã program more flexible, which grants benefits to companies that allow workers to leave for another 60 days after maternity leave (which is 120 days).

The idea is that the worker has the option of using the benefit in the same way as it is today, or choose to enjoy a period of 120 days on a part-time basis, with 50% of the regular workload.

When mothers and fathers are both employed in companies that are part of the program, the government will also allow the additional 60 days to be enjoyed by the man, or shared between the couple. Mandatory paternity leave, however, was maintained at five days.

MP expands Young Apprentice program from two to three years

The government also promises to open 250,000 new vacancies for young people with changes in the apprenticeship program. The president also faces difficulties in leveraging his pre-candidacy in this audience of voters.

Datafolha released at the end of March that, in the 15-24 age group, former President Lula leads in voting intentions, with 51%.

Today, companies can hire young people aged between 14 and 24, for a maximum period of two years. The MP makes these rules more flexible to allow these young people to remain as apprentices for up to three years.

The term will be extended to up to four years in the case of young people hired at age 14 or in the case of the vulnerable, which includes those who are part of Auxílio Brasil beneficiary families. The goal is that 100,000 of the 250,000 new vacancies will be created for this audience by the end of the year.

“Vulnerable young people have a large deficit in training and need more time to be able to compete for an effective vacancy. [no mercado de trabalho]”, said the undersecretary for Human Capital at the Ministry of Economy, Rodrigo Zerbone.

Young people who are attending technical courses can also have their apprenticeship contract extended up to a maximum of four years.

For activities that require a minimum apprentice age of 21, such as security and professional transportation (such as a truck driver), the age limit will be raised to 29.

In the case of young apprentices, the employer must pay the minimum hourly wage, but has fewer charges for collecting FGTS, for example. The rate is 2%, lower than the 8% for workers with a formal contract.

Zerbone says that there is no risk of labor substitution, with the search for more experienced young apprentices to fill positions that would be occupied by other less qualified young people. “What we are changing is to include more vulnerable young people in the program,” she said.

Faced with Bolsonaro’s difficulty with the female electorate, the president’s reelection campaign has invested in a greater participation of first lady Michelle Bolsonaro in the government’s agendas to try to reduce rejection among women voters. She was next to the president at the ceremony at Palácio do Planalto this afternoon.

Instead of speaking, Bolsonaro gave the floor to the president of the women’s bench in the Chamber, deputy Celina Leão (PP-DF).

“I want to greet the women first, on behalf of our First Lady, because she represents who the Brazilian woman really is: a woman, sensitive, sweet, for social causes”, said the deputy.

Then, Celina said that “good women” need to know that Bolsonaro sanctioned 66 projects from the women’s bench.

SEE THE CHANGES FOR WOMEN

• Possibility of redeeming FGTS resources to pay daycare fees for children up to 5 years old, or to pay for qualification courses in areas considered strategic. Values ​​and limits are still to be defined by the fund’s Board of Trustees.
• Encouraging greater participation of the father in the care of the child in the 1st year of life: encouraging the adoption of a part-time regime, use of an hour bank, 12/36-hour workday, anticipation of vacations, flexible entry and exit hours. The objective is to create a culture of division of domestic responsibilities and provide conditions for the mother to reconcile work and family.
• Possibility for parents to withdraw for qualification in a distance course, only with recorded (asynchronous) classes, to have flexible hours and availability to help with the child’s care.
• Flexibility of the Empresa Cidadã program, which grants benefits to companies that allow workers to leave for another 60 days after maternity leave (which is 120 days). The worker will have the option of exchanging the two months for a period of 120 more days on a part-time basis (50% of the regular workload), or sharing with her father, if he is employed by a company that is also part of the program. Mandatory paternity leave, however, was maintained at five days.
• Authorization to suspend the employment contract for professional qualification (lay off) – by agreement, with payment of a qualification scholarship, for women after the period of maternity leave.

SEE MEASURES FOR YOUTH

• Companies will be able to hire young apprentices aged 14 to 24 for a period of up to three years (currently, the maximum term is two years).
• Term will be extended to up to four years in the case of young people hired at the age of 14 or in the case of the vulnerable, which includes those who are part of Auxílio Brasil beneficiary families
• Young people who are attending technical courses can also have their apprenticeship contract extended up to a maximum of four years.
• For security and professional transportation activities, which require a minimum age of 21 years, age limit will be raised to 29 years.
• In the case of young apprentices, the employer must guarantee a minimum hourly wage, but charges are lower (the FGTS rate, for example, is 2%, against 8% in other formal contracts).
• Government foresees opening of 250 thousand new vacancies for young people, being 100 thousand for the most vulnerable.