“Cover up” the poverty of large families: the initiative to pay for housing and communal services with mother’s capital caused a strong reaction

State Duma deputy Yana Lantratova’s proposal that families with many children be allowed to pay for housing and communal services with maternity capital caused a strong reaction.

The public was indignant: how is it that the state gives about 600 thousand for the birth of children (depending on which one is in the account), so that parents do not deny themselves anything – they buy apartments, spend them on education for children, mother’s pension, social adaptation of the child – disabled person. And here we are so mundanely offered to pay with these funds for a communal apartment.

Maybe it’s time to think about why families do not have money for the most basic living expenses?

“My electricity was cut off in April 2022, and all complaints were answered that everything was legal. 5 children from 12 years old to a year old, the youngest disabled person and the mother is a paralyzed disabled person of the 1st group, ”says Yulia from the Stavropol Territory.

In Ust-Labinsk, a mother with many children was turned off the electricity: “We were without electricity all summer until we paid the debt.”

In Bashkiria, a family with 11 children was also deprived of water and electricity due to utility debt.

“MK” found a large family that ended up on the street due to housing and communal debts. So why do people need maternity capital if they have nowhere to live?

Soon we will reach the point where people will ask for permission to buy bread and milk with maternity capital so as not to die of hunger.

This not normal. It is not normal that a large family in Russia is very often synonymous with a poor family. Over 50% of large families are in need.

Moreover, it is impossible to issue a subsidy or benefits, having debts for rent. They need to be paid off first. And how to pay if there is no money? It turns out, a vicious circle.

Marina K. is a resident of Tatarstan. She has three minor children, 16, 13 and 11 years old, the youngest of whom is disabled. Unmarried. By a court decision, she was evicted from the apartment in which she lived with her children, for a debt of 120 thousand rubles. Together with the penalty, 200 thousand ran up in a year. Take nowhere. Because of a sick child, a woman is forced not to work.

The management company won the lawsuits and then sold their square meters at an auction, according to realtors, at a price almost two times lower than the market price – for four and a half million rubles. And there is an apartment in this area – ten. Yes, cheaper – but fast. Debts had to be closed immediately. Patience seems to have run out.

The difference was transferred to the card of the former owner. And – live as you want.

Now the family is renting a house for 25 thousand rubles a month, spending what they received for the apartment sold by the management company. What’s next? The amount received, which is melting every month, is clearly not enough for a new and comfortable one. How legal is it that, because of a not very huge debt of two hundred thousand rubles, a woman with children has lost her corner?

“We are now dealing with this egregious case,” commented Irina Volynets, Commissioner for Children’s Rights in the Republic of Tatarstan, to whom we turned with this story. – Of course, there are questions to the management company, to guardianship, how it happened that the rights of children were violated, and their level and quality of life decreased. Actually, no one thought about children at all. There was no share in the apartment. That’s why everything seemed to go so easily. But they lived there! It’s a shame that my mother asked for help when all the deadlines had already been missed. This is a systemic problem that we observe in a particular example. It is necessary to work on the development of a legislative initiative so that in the future the repetition of this would be impossible.

Guzel A., also from Kazan, has been living with her ten-year-old daughter without electricity since November last year. Until it gets dark, they sit at home, in the evening they go to relatives. The fridge doesn’t work, but there is a balcony. And a gas stove to cook.

Guzel’s debt for electricity is 600 thousand rubles. She understands that she will never be able to pay for him. How to live?

“The debt has appeared since 2012,” says the woman. “And no matter how much I pay now, because of the penalties that increase daily, it doesn’t get smaller, because the debt itself also continues to grow.”

The ex-husband, a person who, according to Guzel, is dysfunctional, dealt with the issue of paying for housing and communal services. “We didn’t have electricity meters. Therefore, the light ran according to the standards. And where others pay 2-3 thousand, it came out 10. I did not pay attention to this, I trusted him. But he didn’t pay for them either. When I realized it, the debt outgrew 100 thousand rubles. Since then, I have been paying back regularly, I have agreed on restructuring, but it is impossible to pay off such a debt in full and immediately. And if you knew how officials talk to me: as if I have no rights, and I myself am to blame for everything. Yes, it happened, but I try to get out of this situation with dignity, I try to pay, but no one wants to listen to anything.

The most interesting thing is that Guzel and her daughter have not had electricity in their apartment since November 2022. But the electricity bill continues to grow in some incredible way. In the payment for December, the woman saw that she had been charged another … 300 rubles.

We cited as an example only those stories that we managed to quickly find. But in fact, this happens everywhere in Russia. There are not even dozens of such cases.

In general, the amount of debt of Russians for utilities over the past year has increased from 738 to 767 billion rubles. A year before that – from July 2020 to July 2021, debts increased by 51 billion rubles (from 687 to 738 billion). Most debtors are just families with children. And what are the authorities doing to solve this problem?

Starting from December 1, 2022, … they increased the tariffs for housing and communal services. Apparently, in order not to pay off the old ones and collect new debts, the Russians did not deny themselves anything.

This, of course, looks wrong and even defiant – to allow paying utility bills with maternity capital. In fact, the measure designed to stimulate the birth rate in Russia is proposed to cover up poverty. But on the other hand – and if it is, then what to hide?

“Maternity capital is a measure of demographic support, and not a fight against poverty, maternity capital should not solve it,” says Inna Yambulatova, secretary of the Hippocratic Medical Forum, which also deals with demographic policy. – The main thing in this matter is consistency and complexity, and not patching holes and a “targeted approach”, which is appropriate only in the sector of helping those who are in trouble. Debts on housing and communal services are shortfalls in income in connection with the birth of a child, families need to compensate for them with separate funds. Moreover, we generally believe that maternity capital should become “family capital”, as in Belarus, and not be directed to the acquisition of housing – “three square meters in a kopeck piece in a residential area”, this is a laugh for chickens.

“If you want to do something useful for the family, then make maternity capital not only for the first and second, but also for each subsequent one with progressive growth. Moreover, it was done accurately and justifiably – measures to support the birth rate should be considered exclusively as investment investments by the state, and not as begging.