Minister Dung said the whole country has basically brought the COVID-19 pandemic under control and officially moved to a new period, proactively adapting and safely living with the pandemic.

From July 1, the Bank for Social Policies, Viet Nam Social Security and localities have urgently implemented policies to support employers and employees following Resolutions 68, 116 and 126, he said. He applauded localities, particularly 23 provinces and cities that applied social distancing, for their great efforts and determination to gain encouraging results.

However, the complicated and prolonged pandemic has seriously affected the lives of people with flows of people leaving cities and urban areas for their hometowns, which led to a disruption in the supply chain in some sectors, areas and regions, urging prompt recovery and development of the labour market to contribute to economic recovery and development.

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Minister Dung said the ministry is building a master plan on recovering and developing the labour market which is part of the socio-economic recovery and development programme of the Government.

Recommendations during the meeting will be sent to the steering committee of the socio-economic recovery and development programme to consider building measures to keep workers and attract those who left for their homes to return to work as well as measures to supplement labour forces for prioritised sectors and areas.

As of October 14, Resolution 68 and Decision 23 supported 24.26 million people with a total expense of nearly VND21.89 trillion. In 23 southern localities alone, 16.8 million people (accounting for 69.5 per cent of the whole country’s eligible people) got financial assistance worth VND17.75 trillion (accounting for 80 per cent of the total financial support of the whole country).

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The implementation of Resolution 116/NQ-CP and Decision 28/2021/QĐ-TTg helped support 428,894 workers who are participating in unemployment insurance and 111,212 people who used to join the unemployment insurance scheme with a total aid of VND1,251 billion.

Following guidance of the Viet Nam Social Security, 363,300 employers with 9.676 million workers will get insurance payment reductions from October 2021 to September 2022 with an estimated total of nearly VND7.6 trillion.

The Prime Minister issued five decisions to allocate a total of 137,090 tonnes of rice for over 2.41 million households with nearly 9.14 million people in 31 localities affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Localities also reported that there were 2,184 children orphaned due to COVID-19. The National Fund for Vietnamese children, in coordination with 27 provinces and cities, has provided VND7.83 billion to 1,541 children orphaned by COVID-19 and 124 newborns whose mothers were infected with COVID-19.

Minister Dung said due to the pandemic, the lives of workers still faced many difficulties but in general, the coverage of basic support policies benefited people. Resolution 68, 116 and 126 have so far helped people to overcome difficulties.

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“Generally, Resolution 42, Resolution 68 and Resolution 116 are humanitarian policies which demonstrated the Party and State’s support for workers and efforts to help people to overcome difficulties. These policies not only benefit workers but also other vulnerable groups such as the old, orphaned children and people with disabilities,” he said.

However, he noted that due to the complicated development of the pandemic, several people have not yet benefited from these policies, urging for the need to tackle shortcomings and increase information dissemination to help people, employers and employees to access support policies promptly and effectively.

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It is also necessary to pay attention to those people who have yet been benefited from support policies such as workers who had their contracts ended or suspended but are not qualified for unemployment insurance and do not get a salary and freelance workers, he said.

He also pointed to the need to increase inspection and supervision over the implementation of policies supporting workers and review the labour and production and business situation to propose measures to attract workers, contributing to help complete the master plan on recovering and developing the labour market.