The Ombudsman initiated an ex officio action and sent two recommendations to the Secretary of State for Social Security and Pensions to study legal changes that would make it possible for subsidies and aid for housing rehabilitation, received by individuals or homeowners’ associations, to be excluded and not to be counted for the purposes of the income limit required to receive the minimum income supplement for contributory pensions (retirement, widowhood, disability), as well as for the receipt of non-contributory pensions.
In the same way, and through this action, it has been recommended that the modification of the Law regulating the Minimum Living Income (IMV) be studied, with the aim of excluding these same subsidies and aid for the renovation of the main residence from the calculation of income foreseen for access to this benefit, in article 20.1.f of the Law.
In the institution’s opinion, the requirement in these cases to reimburse the pension supplement in order to reach the minimum amount causes a disproportionate detriment to the finances of these pensioners, and undermines the purpose and raison d’être for which it was granted. That is, to meet the basic subsistence needs of its beneficiaries.
Along these lines, recent final rulings by the labour courts of different higher courts of justice coincide in stating that it is not possible to include the receipt of a public subsidy intended for the refurbishment of a home to make it suitably habitable, for the purposes of considering the minimum income supplement for exceeding income, to be improperly included as computable income or capital gains.
The institution is currently receiving a significant number of complaints from citizens claiming the minimum allowance, not only for public subsidies granted to individuals, but also to homeowners’ associations for the installation of common structural elements, considered as an increase in the community member’s assets for the amount of the corresponding coefficient of participation.
