IN the middle of last month, we carried a report on urban low-income earners who were not receiving any kind of financial assistance to help them cope with their difficulties. Yesterday, we featured them again because they have still not received any aid. The problem, according to the surau committee that compiled a list of 30 "hardcore poor" families at Taman Sentul Utama flats in Kuala Lumpur, is red tape. The committee was apparently told that the families have to apply to the Welfare Department themselves to receive assistance. But this seems to fly in the face of the open invitation issued by the Minister of Women, Family and Community Development in July to tell the department "if you know of anyone who is a single mother, or has no income, or is poor". The Welfare director-general has also reiterated that his department is more than willing to consider cases referred to it by the public.

It will not do any good to point fingers, and it must be said that the department has made an extra effort to register the poor, disabled and elderly through its "Projek Cari". The 144 local authorities under the Ministry of Housing and Local Government have also been registering poor families in order to provide financial assistance under its urban poverty eradication programme. But it is clear that more should be done by the Welfare Department and other federal and state agencies to identify those in need. This would allow those who could have been overlooked to receive their due from the additional half-a-billion ringgit allocated in the 2009 budget for welfare assistance, or the similar amount collected in zakat last year. The country certainly has the resources to meet the needs of those struggling to make ends meet.

But as the plight of the elderly couple in Taman Sentul Utama suggests, the problem is that with a household income of some RM820 a month they are officially not considered poor at all, unless they happen to be living in Sabah or Sarawak. Hence, like the other family we featured last month, they do not seem to be eligible for assistance. It would seem, then, that the problem is not just that the "urban poor don't get enough aid" as our headline yesterday suggested, but that they are not poor enough to benefit from the social safety nets. This suggests that it is time to revise the poverty line to better reflect the realities of the daily struggle for survival. Otherwise, those who need help will continue to fall through the cracks.