Opposition MP insists on changes

The criteria for those eligible for assistance under the programme for the poor should be adjusted, thinks MP Jondi Baghaturia from Georgian Troupe. He insisted during a briefing on October 29 that who lives below the poverty line should be determined in a different way.

Baghaturia criticised the current criteria for determining who lives below the poverty line as lacking in common sense and unfair. According to the existing criteria if a family has curtains on their windows, a TV set and a refrigerator it is not below the poverty line, but people cannot eat curtains, refrigerators and TV sets, says Baghaturia.

The MP says that anybody whose income is below subsistence level should be eligible to benefit from the programme for the poor. Baghaturia would also change the criteria for calculating the subsistence level: the Ministry of Economy, which makes this calculation, thinks it is GEL 123, but Baghaturia thinks it is GEL 150.

Officially there are 900,000 people living below the poverty line in Georgia. Baghaturia is sure that there are more than 600,000 other people in the same situation who urgently need to be included in the programme.