SEMPIDI ~ Based on data from 2007, there are 4,022 empoverished families in Badung Regency, all of which are required by law to send their children to school for at least nine years, a lawmaker said this week.

“We do not have any special dispensations for the children of poor parents. They must have an education, but not suffer financially because of it,” I Gusti Ayu Tirta of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) said,

He said it was unfortunate that there was no assistance for poor families from the government to help with administrative costs, and that it was not right for them to have to pay the same price as families with more money.

“I think that regional budgets and financing allocation is more than enough to help the poor students,” he said.

The social and education departments were coordinating data on poor families in the regency so they could decide what the next step would be in assisting them, added Tirta.