Family Futures

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] 139

onfronting

amily

overty

In December 2011 a new law on social assistance was adopted

in Romania, creating a unified and coordinated legal and insti-

tutional framework for the development and implementation

of public policies.

Romania has focused income support measures on support-

ing households with children and has introduced an allowance

for families which is linked to the school attendance of children

from the beneficiary families. Over the last year, Romania has

reformed the minimum income scheme by extending the cover-

age of social transfers so that a minimum income is guaranteed

to every citizen. The conditionality of benefits, such as means

testing and linkage with willingness to accept job offers, has been

strengthened. The guaranteed minimum income, family allow-

ance programmes, heating benefit and child-raising allowance

programme, along with some programmes in the social assis-

tance field, were modified beginning in January 2011.

Progress comes from accomplishing many small things, and

we therefore pledge our continuous support for the improve-

ment of the Romanian social assistance system. For the

next period we intend to continue our improvements, being

confident that all these efforts will play a key role in social

assistance development. The measures will include:

• focusing on programmes devoted to low income families

(social aid, family allowances, heating aid)

• harmonizing the eligibility criteria for programmes

devoted to low income families

• consolidating these programmes into one single

programme, whose indicative title should be ‘minimum

insertion income’, for 2013

• raising the co-accountability of those who receive the

minimum insertion income by conditioning the payment

of benefits on the school results of children and on the

active search for a job in the case of parents

• reducing the costs of child-raising allowance and the

period in which it is paid

• consolidating payments to disabled persons into one single

social security benefit and introducing income testing for

all beneficiaries who are part of wealthy families

• performing checks (inspections) in all social assistance

programmes that are exposed to a high risk of error or

fraud (social aid, family benefits, heating aid, benefits paid

to the disabled, child-raising allowances)

• increasing the effectiveness of social inspection activities by

introducing client profiling (a system whereby irregularities

can be reported) and an efficient sanctions policy

• developing an integrated management information system

that should be used for paying social assistance benefits,

for detecting suspected fraud or error cases by cross-

checking the information in public databases, and for

supporting a result-based management model

• interconnecting the databases that refer to social rights

beneficiaries with other relevant data sources

• simplifying administrative procedures by setting up

a single point of submission and establishing a single

application form to claim social assistance benefits.

In 2013, the Romanian Government re-entered a firm path

of combating family poverty. Its measures include increas-

ing the minimum wage by 15 per cent and planning a

continuous increase in 2014; increasing pensions with the

inflation rate by applying the pensions point for the first

time since 2010; introducing electrical energy heat social

aid; increasing the minimum guaranteed income by 13 per

cent; increasing the allowance for family sustainment by 30

per cent; and promoting and adopting a new bill for child

protection to further protect the rights of children with

parents working abroad.

By the end of 2014, Romania will have a new strategy for

combating poverty and promoting social inclusion for 2014-

2020, focused on family as the main social concept.

Romania’s new strategy for combating poverty and promoting social inclusion will focus on family as the main social concept

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