The Tribune

By NATARIO McKENZIE Tribune Business Reporter nmckenzie@tribunemedia.net THE Government is assessing whether to make social security benefits and welfare payments conditional on behaviourby their recipients, Tribune Business has been told. Labour Minister Dion Foulkes told Tribune Business in a recent interview that the implementation of conditional cash transfers (CCT) is among initiatives being discussed with the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB). The IDB, according to its website, is funding a series of diagnostic studies on the effects of the financial crisis on Bahamian society "to generate knowledge and improve social programs and policy decision-making for the most vulnerable groups. It will also conduct feasibility studies for a potential CCT program". Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) programs provide cash payments to poor households that meet certain behavioural requirements, generally related to children's health care and education. Mr Foulkes told Tribune Business: "We, myself and Minister Loretta Butler-Turner, had a meeting with a delegation from the IDB about two weeks ago to discuss the proposal, and there are several things they are looking at. "They are looking at proposing a program for the Bahamas to review our social safety net, and that program has two components. The first is to harmonise all of the services that we now offer through social services, which are quite a bit. They are going to study the whole system we have and the amount of services to see to what extent it can be better harmonised." Mr Foulkes added: "The second thing is CCT, conditional cash transfers. That is a new initiative that many countries are embarking upon, including Jamaica, Brazil and others, aided by the IDB. "That is something we will be looking at. Minister Turner is actually in Jamaica now with a multi-ministerial delegation, looking at how the system is working in Jamaica. "The whole concept is that when benefits are given by social services, those benefits are conditional on the recipient doing certain things, for example attending PTA meetings, participating in the school activities of their children and making sure their kids go to school. It makes the benefits conditional on the recipient doing certain things to improve their lives. That is the whole concept behind CCT. That is something we have agreed to pursue with the IDB."