Shanghai residents who don't regularly visit their parents may face lawsuits or have their credit score affected under a new local regulation, media reported Thursday.
Adults should fulfill their duty to give economic and spiritual support to their parents and "come back home often," according to the new regulation on protecting elderly people's rights and interests.
Family members should also pay regular visits to their parents who live in nursing institutions, according to the regulation.
The regulation will be implemented from May 1 onwards.
Luo Peixin, a deputy director of the Shanghai government legislative affairs office, was quoted by news portal thepaper.cn as saying that aside from influencing people through moral education, the authorities can use legal means to force people to fulfill their duties.
Luo said that elderly people will be able to file a lawsuit to make their children visit them and people who fail to carry out the court-ordered visits will see their credit rating take a hit.
The authorities have not confirmed how much the rating will be affected.
Luo said that Jiangsu and Guangdong provinces as well as Beijing already have similar regulations, asking children to "come back home often."
The Shanghai government has started conducting surveys on improving family pension liability and some governmental departments have started to develop legal networks to help elderly residents better safeguard their legal rights, thepaper.cn reported.
