The Government of Ukraine, in the framework of continuing the pension reform, triggers its new stage - the introduction of an automatic annual indexation of payments aimed to increase the Ukrainian pensioners’ incomes.

This was stated by Prime Minister of Ukraine Volodymyr Groysman during a meeting on the issues pension indexation. President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko and members of the Government were also participating in the meeting.

The attendees noted that the first results of economic reforms, including the reform of the pension system, are already tangible. Currently, we have created prerequisites for solving no less difficult task than counteracting Russian aggression - the fight against poverty. Economic growth must be felt through improving well-being. And here Ukrainian seniors need heightened attention.

The Government, the President, the Parliament have already come up with a series of decisions in this direction. One of those is a mechanism for monetization of subsidies. And since March 1, there will take place indexation of pensions.

Such an increase will be held in an automatic regime, thereby completely removing the political implications of the pension issue.

Moreover, this year, an additional supplement will be received by those seniors, who had long employee tenure, but they used to have poor wages, and therefore a minimum pension. The additional payment will be financed, including at the expense of the funds received from the customs clearance of cars on foreign registration numbers. "We are starting a new stage in the reforming of the pension system. In 2017, there arose a need for building a fair system, overcoming the Pension Fund deficit and avoiding an increase in retirement age. We have succeeded. And in October 2017, we began to recalculate pensions", said Volodymyr Groysman. "On an annual basis in the future, we will carry out pension recalculation, in order to overcome the key challenge - the poverty of pensioners."

The Head of Government stressed that the standard of living is usually measured by the standard of living of children and pensioners. And there is a middle class between those categories who are employed, get wages and pay taxes. And these funds are transferred to improve the quality of life of the elderly.

"We shall advance in our actions. I assure you that on our part this is neither the first nor the last increase. We can provide that, based on the real state of the economy. Our task is to take care of the poorest citizens", said Volodymyr Groysman.

Background

Due to the Government reform of the pension system, in October 2017, about 10 million pensioners received an increased pension depending on a number of factors - including the dangerous working conditions and seniority. In 2018, military pensioners received an increase in pensions. The second wave of improvement was made by the Government in January 2019.