European and national authorities and civil society to present models for the transition from institutional care to community-bases services

The Ministry of Labour, Family, Social Protection and Elderly, the Ministry of European Funds, UNICEF Romania and HHC Romania gathered to offer institutional support for attracting European funds for community-bases services, with a focus on children protection, as well as preventing and reducing the institutionalisation of children and adults in Romania.

At this meeting, Jean-Claude Legrand, Co-chair of the European Expert Group (EEG), mentioned that EEG members are prominent stakeholders representing people with care or support needs including children, people with disabilities, people experiencing mental health problems, families, people experiencing homelessness; as well as service providers, public authorities and intergovernmental organizations. To help this disadvantaged category of persons, they created two reference documents in order to help accessing European funds: a set of ‘Common European Guidelines on the Transition from Institutional to Community-based care’ and a ‘Toolkit on the use of European Union Funds’ (translations in more than 10 languages).

According to a simple calculation, a social worker who is paid 20,000 RON a year, who prevents the institutionalisation of just one child, saves the state 120,000 RON. UNICEF’s experience at the local level shows that social workers do much more than that. Using European funding to support the transition and reform period makes sense: it is in line with the EU fundamental values and its constitution; and it respond to the call for reforms in the 28 member states.

According to the representative of UNICEF Romania, Sandie Blanchet, under the leadership of successive Romanian Governments, in partnership with many local and international actors, the number of children in institution has gone from over 100,000 to 24,000. The number of children in alternative services, such as foster care and guardianship, has increased from virtually zero to 42,000. As a result, Romania’s rate on institutionalisation for children is now in the European average. Furthermore, in the past 10 years, the number of children separated from their families has been stagnant: around 60,000.

Currently, UNICEF Romania calls for a decrease in the number of children in institutions and particularly a ban on the institutionalisation of children under the age of 3 as a matter of priority. This will also require strengthening alternative services to institutionalisation.