All unemployed persons are eligible for CSSA so long as the value of their assets does not exceed the prescribed limit (for cash savings: $26,650 for a single person household and $17,750 for each member of a family) and their income is less than their CSSA entitlement.
Also, there is no need for the applicant to satisfy any qualifying period of unemployment in order to be eligible for CSSA.
Meanwhile, CSSA recipients are encouraged to earn income through work with a view to moving towards self-sufficiency.
To provide an incentive to work, a CSSA recipient's monthly earnings can be disregarded up to a maximum of $1,210 in the calculation of his CSSA entitlement. For certain CSSA recipients who get full-time jobs, their first month income will also be disregarded.
Mr Wong said the Administration's first priority was to help the workers who had lost their jobs to be employed again quickly.
"To this end, the Local Employment Service (LMS) of the Labour Department has been enhanced with the introduction of the Job Matching Programme (JMP) in April this year and this service is available in all nine LMS offices throughout the territory.
"So far, the success rate has been encouraging and we have already found jobs for over 800 job seekers under the programme," he said.
In addition, special outreach teams of the Labour Department are providing on the spot assistance and advice to workers affected by retrenchment.
Another priority area was to ensure that workers possessed the skills to re-enter or remain in the workforce through retraining schemes, Mr Wong said
He pointed out that unemployed workers were given priority in enrolling in retraining courses and the Government was working with employers to set up tailor- made courses to retrain people to fill actual vacancies. "We understand that 1,100 retrainees were successfully placed in the month of July," he noted.
End/Friday, September 1, 1995
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