Chairman Kim Hyeon-ki of the Seoul Metropolitan Council (SMC) has spearheaded efforts to deal with the low-birth rate issue facing the nation.
Chairman Kim, framing the next five years as the “golden time” to solve the issue, called for reestablishing priority policies.
The council recently approved the amendment of ordinances on the support of multi-children families, lowering from three children to two and enacted ordinances on supporting infertility.
Chairman Kim said the Council inaugurated a special committee to cope with the “demographic cliff,” caused by the low-birth rate, and it has made comprehensive evaluations, such as supporting pregnancy and childbirth, nurturing children, housing and welfare, youth employment, balancing work and life, improving welfare regimes and suggested alternative options.
Chairman Kim said, “Seoul Metropolitan Council will continue to make efforts to solve the low-birth rate issue while expanding necessary investments and support.”
As for the “fiscal swap,” Chairman Kim spoke of a severe fiscal imbalance. In an interview with a vernacular journal, he said, “The Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education owns cash assets worth 3.6 trillion won while the Seoul Metropolitan Government saw its debts surge 1,120 billion won to 11,898 billion won as of 2022.”
The fiscal swap, an option designed to solve the fiscal imbalance, means a concept of changing the surplus on an educational account into loans in a general account, he said.
Kim said the swap was a concept similar to the “currency swap,” which was done in the United States at the time of the financial crisis in 2008, and the cap on the fiscal swap will be limited to 20 to 30 percent of the surplus.”
In order to put into practice the proposal, Chairman Kim said the act on financial grants for local education needs to be amended.
A bill on the revision of the act has been already submitted, and the government is to come up with its position on the issue with a meeting of the “Central-Provincial Cooperation Council”, to be presided over by President Yoon Suk-yeol soon.
Chairman Kim Hyeon-ki of the Seoul Metropolitan Council declares the opening of the first session of the 321st Regular Meeting of the council on Nov. 1. (Photo: Yonhap News Agency)
Chairman Kim said the ruling People Power Party submitted a measure to revise the ordinances on treating and protecting of officials with the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education.
The rationale for the bill on the revision of the ordinances is that stressing too much students’ rights would relatively ignore teachers’ educational rights.
The revision bill would stipulate early stage response and protection steps, such as managing online malicious petitions, being submitted by parents and temporarily separating of the relevant teacher and the student in case of suspected infringement of educational activities.
Besides the revision measure, several bills, including ones to annul and revise ordinances on the protecting of students’ rights, have been submitted.
Kim said the measures are designed to improve the quality of education and establish mutual respect and cooperation among students, teachers and parents.
As for the extending of underground passages along the Dongbu Trunk Road, Chairman Kim said that a feasibility study had been launched on the last section of the road, connecting Daechi and Ilwon interchanges.
Kim said the 11th Seoul Metropolitan Council had initiated changes with the goal of “correcting abnormal things.”
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