The legislation stipulating the support available to displaced people from Ukraine in Romania has been changed, introducing a new scheme regulating accommodation and food subsidies.

The new scheme replaces the original mechanism - which allocated a certain amount towards accommodation and food per person per day - with a lump sum for accommodation granted to cover a period of 4 months per family or per single person, and a second lump sum per person for food. 

After these 4 months recipients can continue to receive the accommodation subsidy until the end of 2023, provided they fulfil certain additional conditions. These conditions include the ability to show proof of employment or that they are actively job seeking, and proof that any children are enrolled in the mainstream education system or other accredited educational programmes.

These changes were introduced to reduce the possibility of fraud in the accommodation subsidies system. However, certain conditions are sometimes difficult to meet: people with disabilities can struggle to obtain disability certificates from Romanian authorities, for example; chronically ill recipients can struggle to actively seek work, there are not always enough spaces to enrol children in nurseries and kindergartens, and the application process imposes very tight deadlines.

Read the full governmental decision - no. 368/2023 - introducing these changes here.