Finland's government wants to make significant changes to the country's child benefits system.
If the proposals are implemented, parents would receive a flat payment of 100 euros per child per month, with the rate staying the same for each subsequent child.
Currently, the system works incrementally — with 94.88 euros per month paid for the first child, 104.84 euros for the second, 133.79 euros for the third, 173.24 euros for the fourth, and 192.69 euros from the fifth onwards.
The government's proposal also suggests removing the payment of supplemental benefits — such as the single parent additional allowance of 73.30 euros per child as well as the extra for children under 3, which currently stands at 26.00 euros per child.
Instead, the government wants the single parent supplement to be replaced by an equitable increase in child maintenance allowance, while general housing allowance and study grant guardian supplement could also be increased on a case-by-case basis.
In addition to the introduction of a flat benefit payment and the removal of supplements, the government also wants to extend the payment period of the benefit — until the child turns 18. Currently, Kela stops paying the regular child benefit at the end of the month when the child turns 17.
Social Security Minister Sanni Grahn-Laasonen (NCP) said she considers it important for child benefits to remain universal in the future, but noted that the government's proposals would not be implemented during this parliamentary term.
"I hope that the parties will familiarise themselves with this report thoroughly and form their positions on it over time. The child benefit is definitely an institution worth preserving and cherishing," she said.
Change would hit bigger and single-parent families hardest
The proposals are included in a report commissioned by the government and prepared by the Ministry of Social Affairs under the leadership of the ministry's specialist Liisa Siika-aho as well as by Kela's interim director Kari-Pekka Mäki-Lohiluoma.
The report's authors noted that a uniform child benefit payment would guarantee equality among both children and parents, adding that the working group did not support the idea of linking child benefits to parents' incomes.
According to Siika-aho, Finland's child benefit system was built in a different time and based on a different concept of family. It has also been reformed in separate stages, she added, but never as a whole.
"Children are not equally valuable from the system's perspective at the moment," Siika-aho said.
However, she acknowledged that the proposed changes would have a disproportionate impact on larger families as well as single parents. This was also backed up by impact assessments, which found the reform would hit families with at least four children or only one parent the hardest.
"We in no way want to increase poverty among families, and that's why we sought various compensation methods for low-income families. These can be found in housing allowances, study benefits, and child maintenance allowances," Siika-aho explained.
Reversing Finland's birth rate trend
The government commissioned the Ministry of Social Affairs to investigate the issue as it looks for ways to tackle Finland's falling birth rate — which hit a record low in 2024.
As the last major reform of the child benefits system was carried out in 1994, the government also wants to better take into account the diversification of families, such as the increase in blended families and single parenthood by choice.
The topic has been widely discussed in recent years. Kela's Director General Lasse Lehtonen, who is on long-term sick leave, suggested last year that the younger a person is when they have a child, the more child benefit they should receive.
Tuulia Hakola-Uusitalo, director general of the VATT economic research institute, said at the time that financial incentives, such as changing the amount of child benefit, would have a very mild effect on birth rates.
