PHILIPSBURG–The Anti-Poverty Platform and St. Maarten Consumers Coalition on Thursday called for operational audits to be conducted at Social and Health Insurances SZV and at the Department of Civil Registry.
Platform representative Raymond Jessurun told reporters at a press conference that the number of former employees under SZV’s sickness insurance fund ZV seems very high when compared to the number of persons registered as residing legally in the country.
Jessurun said Health Minister Emil Lee had indicated in a recent parliament meeting that there were 67,000 workers under the ZV fund, while the number of persons registered as living in St. Maarten was much lower. It should be noted that persons without legal residence are also entitled to SZV insurance if they are working and meet the income criteria.
“How is this possible? According to the STAT [Department of Statistics – Ed.] and the Census Office, in 2014 there were officially 41,109 persons registered in St. Maarten. Why are there more people registered at SZV than that there are people registered in St. Maarten? Does this mean that SZV has 26,000 undocumented workers insured and living in St. Maarten?” Jessurun asked.
“We want the Parliament of St. Maarten to demand an operational audit at SZV and at the Civil Registry to determine what is wrong in the data gathering and database maintenance of the SZV database, because these figures of the civil registry and SZV do not match.”
Jessurun also asked why the ZV sickness fund was operating in the red. Lee had painted a grim picture of how some of the funds being managed by SZV are doing financially, during the parliament meeting.
He had said at the time that while the old age, widows’ and orphans’ pension AOV/AWW, long-term care insurance AVBZ and severance pay insurance in the event of bankruptcy Cessantia are financially healthy, the two largest funds – retired civil servants’ health insurance FZOG and sickness and accident insurance ZV/OV are operating at huge losses.
In 2012 the ZV/OV sickness and accident insurance funds had a negative reserve balance of -27.8 million guilders; in 2013 it was -37.5 million; in 2014 it stood at -23.1 million; in 2015 it was -39.6; in 2016 it was -69.8 million; and in 2017 it rose to -108 million. In 2018, the negative reserve for the sickness and accident insurance fund is expected to increase to -148 million.
The FZOG fund, on the other hand, had a reserve deficit of -3.3 million in 2012; -5.1 million in 2013; -5.6 million in 2014; -9 million in 2015; -11.1 million in 2016; and -16.9 million in 2017.
At Thursday’s press conference, Jessurun questioned why the Minister had not informed parliament that SZV received a positive reserve for the FZOG fund of NAf. 323,343 with the division of assets of the former Netherlands Antilles.
“What is the explanation for the deficits since 2012?” he asked. “Minister Lee did not inform parliament about the discrimination imposed on retired civil servants. Retired civil servants’ health care benefits were not any more awarded as prescribed by law to be the same as for active civil servants.
“Since the FZOG retirees were integrated in the ZV fund they get the same benefits as all private sector workers and seniors and provided with the same benefits as workers and their family members without any legal basis provided by parliament.
“What was the intention of the integration of FZOG in the ZV/OV funds exactly? What is the legislation that provided that cut in the benefits of civil servant retirees? If the FZOG fund had deficits and it was integrated in the ZV/OV fund, the question comes up: were ZV/OV premiums from private sector workers used to pay for FZOG costs of healthcare reduced to the same level as arranged for ZV/OV insured?
“Minister Lee also did not inform parliament that SZV got a positive reserve for the ZV/OV fund of NAf. 23,568,577 and NAf. 659,204 respectively with the division of assets of the (former) Netherlands Antilles. According to the annual SVB report of 2009, government of St. Maarten already had an accumulated debt to the ZV fund of NAf. 16,481,179 so what is the explanation for the deficits in the ZV/OV fund since 2012?
“The FZOG fund was integrated with the ZV/OV fund before 10-10-10. Minister Lee said in Parliament that since 2009, 60-plus seniors (which is now seniors ages 62-plus since the pension age has increased) had been added to the ZV medical insurance and the number of seniors in the fund is growing at a high pace.
“So, it seems that Minister Lee and SZV want to blame the 60-plus seniors for the increasing deficits in the sickness/insurance funds.
“But before 10-10-10 the history within the Netherlands Antilles showed that the reason for the increase of the deficits in the ZV/OV fund was not the workers and their family members in the fund, but pressure to adjust and increase the tariffs and the budgets in health care, and the tariff increases of health care providers (such as hospital in Curacao, general practitioners and specialists).
“Furthermore, medical referrals and prosthesis have increased the health care costs of the fund, whereas there was no premium increase This we could read in the SVB Netherlands Antilles annual report of 2009.
“In St. Maarten there were also tariff increases for health care providers after 10-10-10. No word from Minister Lee about the tariff increases of health care providers in St. Maarten, but he blames the higher health care costs because of more seniors participating in the ZV/OV fund.”
Several other issues were raised at the press conference, including the National Recovery and Resilience Plan.
Source: The Daily Herald https://www.thedailyherald.sx/islands/83135-anti-poverty-platform-consumers-coalition-call-for-audits-of-szv-and-civil-registry-dept
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