Olaf Scholz meets with social partners and associations.
(Photo: Getty Images)
Berlin A month and a half ago, Olga Melnyk, her partner and their two children fled from Kyiv to Düsseldorf. Since then, she says, the bureaucracy has kept her busy. Just last week, the Ukrainian waited in line with her family to have her fingerprints taken for registration. Despite an appointment, it took ten hours before it was their turn. “I was really shocked,” says the young woman.
Otherwise, the family hasn’t really arrived yet. The children are already going to elementary school. However, the teachers quickly noticed that the children were a year ahead of their class in terms of subject matter, and the eldest child now has to go to a grammar school. Olga emphasizes: “And it’s not so easy to organize this change.”
The family has applied for the health insurance card, but has not yet received it. She doesn’t get any financial support either, at the moment the five live on their savings.
Olga reports: “We would like to work, but we haven’t had time to look for a job yet.” She is very grateful to Germany for the great support. But some things would certainly be easier if there was a central point of contact for refugees, says the Ukrainian.
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The federal police have identified 379,123 refugees since the beginning of the war on February 24, as the Federal Ministry of the Interior announced on Twitter on Monday. However, the actual number is likely to be higher, since Ukrainians are allowed to enter the country for 90 days without a visa and there are no stationary border controls. Many other refugees are likely to face the same problems that Olga reports.
Agreement was reached on these basic principles
That is why Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD), Integration Commissioner Reem Alabali-Radovan and several federal ministers invited representatives from municipalities, states, authorities and associations to the Chancellery on Monday in order to clear any remaining hurdles.
It is uncertain when the refugees will be able to return to their homeland, said Alabali-Radovan: “That’s why we have to create perspectives and participation in our country for the people who have fled.”
The heads of government of the federal and state governments had already agreed on the basics at their meeting on April 7th. For example, that from June onwards, Ukrainian refugees will no longer be subject to the Asylum Seekers Benefits Act, but rather to Book II of the Social Code.
This would have the advantage that the job centers would be responsible for granting assistance and finding work. Refugees would therefore receive help from a single source. The basic security benefits are also slightly higher than the support under the Asylum Seekers Benefits Act. However, the legal implementation is still a long time coming. They will be “done as soon as possible,” said a spokesman for the Ministry of Labor on Monday.
Alabali-Radovan wants to enable refugees to participate more in Germany.
(Photo: dpa)
At the beginning of April, the federal government had also promised to provide the federal states with personnel and material support in registering refugees and to procure additional PIK recording terminals.
This is used to transmit fingerprints and personal data to the Central Register of Foreigners. There were bottlenecks here because devices were missing or necessary software updates were not carried out. Registering at the immigration office became a bottleneck for many refugees, and as Olga and her family’s experience shows, the problem has not yet been solved everywhere.
Sensible distribution of the refugees necessary
At the meeting in the Chancellery, Interior Minister Nancy Faeser pointed out that 84 percent of the refugees were women and 58 percent came with their children. “They urgently need our help,” said the SPD politician.
The cities, together with the states, have already set out to organize childcare and lessons for Ukrainian children, said the President of the German Association of Cities, Mayor Markus Lewe.
But: “We need significantly more capacity here.” The federal government should contribute to the costs, and rapid recognition procedures for teachers and educators from Ukraine are also necessary.
The municipalities are also interested in a sensible distribution of the refugees. The President of the German Association of Towns and Municipalities, Ralph Spiegler, told the Handelsblatt: “This explicitly means a fair division between urban and rural regions.”
A coordinated procedure is necessary so that neither the municipalities nor the volunteers are overburdened. Spiegler, who is the mayor of the Nieder-Olm association of municipalities, said: “Here we are demanding greater commitment from the federal government.”
More: Read the latest developments on the Ukraine war in the live blog