One of the most important goals of the newly formed government is to provide even greater assistance to mothers. We would like to express our appreciation and support for mothers to an even greater extent than we have done so far.
We are standing by mothers and prospective mothers in all life situations: when they are preparing to have children, when they are expecting children, and when their first, second or third child is born. When they decide that they want to stay at home with their child, when they want to study or work parallel to raising a child, when they decide to create a home, when they send their children to nursery school, kindergarten and school, and when after several decades of working and raising children they decide that they would like to retire and spend more time with their grandchildren.
This is why the national government has introduced the family tax system, family tax allowances and the childcare benefit (GYED) extra scheme, and has reintroduced the three-year maternity leave system for mothers. Family support has been increasing continuously since 2010: the family tax allowance for families with two children is being doubled between 2016 and 2019, we are already providing half a million children with free school meals and over a million children with free school textbooks.
We are spending more money than ever before on helping families buy their first home and on helping families with several children to reduce their taxes: we are waiving significant sums of money from their mortgage arrears and student loan debts.
As well as increasing the minimum wage, we have also increased the sum of childcare benefit and childcare benefit for mothers with diplomas, in addition to which the infant care allowance and child-care fee have also increased significantly in recent years. Beginning in January, Hungarian mothers living or residing abroad are also receiving a single motherhood benefit payment following the birth of a child, and the child bond scheme will be extended to include the whole Carpathian Basin.
The newly formed government will continue the measures it has introduced to assist families with children and would like to make Hungary into a family-friendly country in which mothers and families with children receive all possible support.