$120 monthly disability grants begin in October

Stipend allotted for families taking care of frail and disabled members.

Under the new Foreign Domestic Worker Grant (FDWG), eligible families whose foreign domestic workers take care of family members who are frail or with moderate disabilities will be given $120 per month effective October 2012.

The grant has a budget of $25M for the next five years and is expected to benefit more than 6,000 households, according to the Ministry of Community Development, Youth and Sports (MCYS) in a release.

“This grant will help alleviate the cost of families who hire Foreign Domestic Workers to take care of frail or disabled family members. As caring for the frail elderly and disabled can be challenging, I also hope that more families will send their foreign domestic workers for training so that they can be better equipped to serve as caregivers," said Minister of State Mdm Halimah Yacob.

To qualify, MCYS said households must have a per capita monthly income of $2,200 or less. For households with no income, the annual value of their property should be less than $13,000.

The foreign domestic worker must take care of an elderly person or person with disabilities who have been assessed as having at least moderate disabilities by a panel of General Practitioners (GPs) i.e. they require assistance with some Activities of Daily Living such as showering or bathing, feeding, dressing, toileting, transferring or mobility. Please refer to CEL’s website at www.cel.sg for the list of GPs.

Households will also be required to send their foreign domestic workers for relevant training in care giving. The existing Caregivers Training Grant (CTG) can be used by eligible persons to defray the cost of training.