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Lawmakers began deliberating the first constitutional guarantee
of a comprehensive social security system Monday, calling it a key
policy to ensure that each citizen gets a fair slice of the
country's tremendous economic growth in the past two decades.
The draft amendment to the Constitution, submitted to the
ongoing second session of the 10th National People's Congress
(NPC), takes in many unprecedented changes, including a new item
stipulating that "the state should establish and improve a
comprehensive social security system in line with the economic
development."
"A country cannot solely pursue economic development, just as a
cook cannot only care about the size of a cake. How to cut up the
cake is also a question," said Zheng Gongcheng, a member of the
10th NPC Standing Committee.
Zheng, also professor with the School of Labor Relations and
Human Resources under the People's University of China, considered
it was because of the dramatic changes in social conflicts after
China carried out the reform and opening-up policies that the
social security issue was finally brought to the spotlight.
"Though China has stepped out of poverty, the gaps between the
rich and the poor, the urban and rural areas, and among different
regions are expanding. The conflicts between employers and
laborers, and between the migrant rural population and city
dwellers are also worsening," Zheng said.
Statistics show that 80 percent of Chinese laborers and old
people receive no pension insurance, and 90 percent of the total
population do not enjoy basic medical insurance. There has not been
any fixed mechanism to subsidize poor people in rural areas.
Liu Suhua, a professor with the Party School of the Central
Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC), said the country's
900 million farmers would become the largest group of beneficiaries
to the imminent change in the Constitution.
"The current social security system only covers city residents.
But when it is written in the Constitution, it will ensure every
Chinese citizen can enjoy equal rights in this regard," Liu
said.
She believed a comprehensive social security system was also a
reflection and guarantee of "respect and protection of human
rights", another new amendment to the Constitution, and would drive
the government to focus on services rather than administration.
Xia Xueluan, a professor with the sociology department
of?Peking University, hailed the social security amendment as
"absolutely good news", considering the increasingly severe
unemployment problem in China.
The urban registered unemployment rate in the country reached
4.3 percent by the end of 2003. With a population of some 1.3
billion, China will have an extra 400,000 unemployed people if the
rate increases by 0.1 percentage point.
Sociologists consider the jobless worse than farmers, as farmers
"at least have some land to grow grain for food".
"A comprehensive social security system" mentioned in the
amendment was not an empty concept, said Xia, adding it should
include unemployment insurance, pension insurance, medical
insurance and temporary subsidy.
He said the approval of the amendment would accelerate the
formulation of related laws and regulations, and predicted the law
on unemployment would be brought to the legislation agenda soon
after the NPC's 10-day session this year.
People can enjoy their constitutional rights only with
protection of specific laws and regulations, such as those
concerning pension insurance, medical insurance, social welfare, as
well as matching implementation, management and supervision
mechanisms, Xia said.
China's Constitution has undergone three overhauls since its
promulgation in 1982. The approval of the Constitutional amendments
requires a two-thirds overwhelming majority of the nearly 3,000
deputies to the NPC.
(Xinhua News Agency March 10, 2004)
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