The Minister of Labour, Solidarity and Social Security, Ana Mendes Godinho, revealed, this Thursday, that the social sector has 600 million euros of investment underway at the moment.

“At this moment, we have 600 million euros of social investment happening in the dimension of social responses (…) Since the crèches, since the responses to people with disabilities, since the responses to older people, since that investment that we are seeking to do also in the transformation of Social Security itself to be able to be more efficient, more personalized and be able to solve the real problems that people have,” said the minister.

The information was given in Fundão, where today the minister participated in the presentation of two collaborative residence projects, which fit into the new generation of social responses, within the community and according to the new profiles and new needs of the recipients.

This visit to Fundão is part of the “Closer Government” initiative, which took place between Wednesday and today, in the Castelo Branco district. Ana Mendes Godinho also had scheduled for today the inauguration of a new Residential Structure for the Elderly in Silvares.

In the sessions in which she participated during the afternoon, the minister highlighted the importance of all social responses and said that the Recovery and Resilience Plan (RRP) has about 420 million euros dedicated to new generation solutions, with 600 projects already underway, 22 of which relate to collaborative housing that result from pilot projects proposed by the promoters based on the needs and specifics of each bet and respective target audience.

“These are completely new answers, innovative answers, in the scope of collaborative housing. Each one of them has a different project, some are, for example, for the integration of people with disabilities and their families, allowing cohabitation in autonomous spaces, in the homes of the families themselves. Others are responses to promote interaction between students and older people. We also have a project for small houses for temporary housing, for example, when parents are accompanying their children during hospital treatment,” he explained.

In the case of Fundão, one of the projects will be promoted by Santa Casa da Misericórdia do Fundão and aims to transform a social neighborhood that is in a state of degradation into a collaborative housing neighborhood, which will have 18 independent housing units for autonomous elderly people or people with disabilities, but also autonomous and still in a situation of social vulnerability as immigrants in processes of autonomization.

It will have a building that provides common services, a community vegetable garden, and is an environmentally and energetically sustainable project, with the houses being connected by a sidewalk that will have photovoltaic panels. The total investment is 1.1 million Euros.

The other project was established with the Centro Assistencial Cultural e Formativo do Fundão. With the name ‘Quinta do Prado’, it will be built from scratch in interconnection with the rural environment that will have 21 small autonomous villas, but close together and with common spaces. According to the promoters, it will be an open and dynamic space. The total investment is about 1.5 million euros.