site.btaUPDATED Parents Hold Nationwide Protest for Higher Maternity Allowances
Parents staged a protest outside the Council of Ministers building in Sofia on Wednesday, calling for higher maternity allowances. The protest, held under the slogan "Maternity Is Not Charity", was organized through social media.
Police were present in the area. Demonstrators carried placards reading, "We Want Care, Not Promises," "The Future Is in Our Hands. It Is Everyone's Responsibility!" and "For the Children, For the Families, For Bulgaria."
Protests were also held in more than ten other cities across the country, including Burgas, Varna, Ruse, Pazardzhik, Pleven, Sliven, Yambol, Shumen, Karlovo, Velingrad, Dobrich and Stara Zagora.
The protesters' main demand is an increase in the maternity allowances paid during the second year of parental leave. They argue that the current amount is inadequate and does not reflect the actual cost of raising a child. Their other demands include annual indexation of maternity and child allowances, a higher compensation rate for mothers who return to work during the second year of maternity leave, equal access to child allowances for all working parents, sufficient places in public nurseries and kindergartens, higher compensation for children who cannot secure a place in a state-run nursery or kindergarten, and a long-term government policy to encourage higher birth rates and support young families.
"We want the promised 75%," one of the protest organizers in Sofia, Sevdalina Noykova, said, referring to the compensation paid to mothers who forgo part of their maternity leave and return to work. "Ultimately, we want it to be 100%, but today we saw that they abstained from voting on that proposal. Apparently, mothers are not a priority. The demographic crisis is not a priority. The fact that, according to the United Nations, Bulgaria's population is projected to shrink by 25% by 2050 is also not a priority for the government," she said.
"We no longer believe in promises. We want concrete measures," Noykova added, warning that the protests would continue if the authorities failed to address their demands.
"Maternity allowances have not been increased since 2023, and child allowances have remained unchanged for nine years. Once a child turns two, there is virtually no state support," another Sofia organizer, Vanya Todorova, said.
She said that representatives of the civic initiative Parents for Decent Maternity had met earlier on Wednesday with Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Galab Donev and Labour and Social Policy Minister Nataliya Efremova at the Finance Ministry to discuss proposals for changes to family support policies in this year's draft budget. "We have also sent our proposals to all parliamentary groups, but so far only one has expressed clear support. We will also seek a meeting with Sofia Mayor Vassil Terziev to discuss ways of addressing the acute shortage of kindergarten places, which in practice also has an impact on the state budget," Todorova said.
Speaking at a news briefing, Donev said that the parents' demands were broadly in line with the increases in spending in this year's budget. At this stage, the budget draft provides for expanding the number of families eligible for allowances under the Family Allowances Act, he said. This means that the number of families receiving allowances will not decrease. In fact, more families will become eligible, he added. Donev noted that the draft also provides for increasing the tax relief available to individuals with children, including children with disabilities.
Later in the day, the Finance Ministry spoke of the meeting between Donev, Efremova and the protest organizers in Sofia in a press release. According to the officials, some of the proposals would require further refinement because certain benefits are financed through the social insurance system while others are funded through social assistance and therefore follow different rules.
Efremova pointed to the European programme Parents in Employment, under which parents can hire a nanny with state support to facilitate their return to work.
Donev said that studies conducted so far indicate that financial incentives are not the primary factor behind higher birth rates and argued that long-term policies creating favourable conditions for raising children are more important. He added that the draft 2026 budget would preserve tax relief for families with children and raise the income threshold for monthly family allowances.
/RY/
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