Direct Request (CEACR) - adopted 1989, published 76th ILC session (1989)

Social Security (Minimum Standards) Convention, 1952 (No. 102) - Netherlands (Ratification: 1962)

1. The Committee takes note of the Government's detailed report and notes the new amendments to the legislation concerning the various insurance schemes. It also notes that these amendments, although they contain certain improvements - particularly regarding equal treatment for men and women in respect of the amount of the benefits and of the extension of the scope of medical care and unemployment insurance - contain restrictive measures such as the reduction in benefit levels, the increase in the rate of sharing by insured persons in the cost of health care, the increase in contributions, etc. While aware of the need for certain measures to curb the growing costs of social security, the Committee hopes that the Government will make every effort to ensure that such measures have no adverse effects on the application of the Convention.

2. The Committee also takes note of the information supplied by the Government in reply to its previous comments and would like to point out the following:

(a) Part II (Medical care), Article 10, paragraph 1(b), and Part VIII (Maternity benefit), Article 49, paragraph 2 of the Convention. The Committee requested the Government to state whether the sharing by the beneficiaries in the cost of medical care in the event of maternity, provided for in the national health care scheme, concerns only home or "local" care given by "a maternity attendant", or whether it also relates to pre-natal, confinement and post-natal care given by a medical practitioner or qualified midwife. In the second case, the provisions of national law and practice would be contrary to the Convention. The Government confirms in its report that, in case of maternity, beneficiaries must share in the cost of medical care, even when such care is prescribed by a medical practitioner in a hospital or specialised nursing home. It also indicates that the Act of 1 April 1986 concerning access to health insurance (WTZ), amending the General Sickness Insurance Act, provides for the possibility of recourse - without any special conditions having to be met - to a standard private health insurance under government supervison and that this insurance is regulated by the provisions on private medical insurance, access to which is governed by the conditions laid down in the Act of 27 March 1986. The Committee notes this information and the reasons why the Government adopted this policy, which aims to encourage confinement at home, and in 1980 abolished free hospital care in this case. The Committee nevertheless recalls that the above-mentioned provisions of the Convention do not authorise sharing by beneficiaries in the cost of medical care in the case of maternity and it hopes that the Government will consider re-examining the question and taking the necessary measures to ensure more effective application of the Convention on this point.

(b) Part XIII (Common provisions), Article 71, paragraph 2. In reply to the Committee's previous comments, the Government indicates that the financing of social security schemes is provided, according to the various branches, either entirely by contributions from employers (as is the case of family benefit, for example) or entirely by contributions from beneficiaries (as, for example, in the case of old-age, invalidity and survivors' benefits), or by 50 per cent contributions from each (as is the case for unemployment benefit). The Committee nevertheless notes from the statistical data provided by the Government in connection with the European Code of Social Security, that the share borne by employees protected in the constitution of the insurance resources attained, in 1987, 54.5 per cent of the total of these resources, whereas under the above-mentioned provision of the Convention, the total of the insurance contributions borne by the employees protected, and their wives and children (except those for family benefit, already taken into consideration in the statistics of the Government) must not exceed 50 per cent. The Committee hopes that the Government will make every effort to ensure that the contribution of these beneficiaries to the financial resources of the insurance schemes does not exceed the rate fixed by the Convention.

3. The Committee has also examined the new legislation on unemployment insurance (Act of 6 November 1986) and requests the Government to furnish certain particulars on the following points:

Part IV (Unemployment benefit), Article 24 (in conjunction with Article 69). Under section 19, subsections 1(k) and (l) of the above-mentioned Act, unemployed workers who are on holiday or who have lost their employment as a result of a strike or a lock-out are not entitled to unemployment benefit. Since, in the first of these cases, the Convention does not provide for any grounds of suspension and, in the second case, suspension of benefits is only authorised when the person concerned has lost his employment as a direct result of a work stoppage due to a trade dispute, the Committee requests the Government to indicate the manner in which the above provisions of the national legislation are applied in practice and to provide, if possible, examples of cases in which they have been applied. [The Government is asked to report in detail for the period ending 30 June 1990.]