More information
Description
This project helps people from Ukraine who have come to the City of Toruń because of the war to legalise their stay and obtain the right to work in Poland. The project responds to the problems raised by the Ombudsman in his comments on the draft amendment of the Law of 12 March 2022 on assistance to citizens of Ukraine in connection with the armed conflict on the territory of that country and some other laws. We are also responding to the challenges we face on a daily basis when working with people from Ukraine from March 2022. The legal changes may be disadvantageous for those people from Ukraine who arrived in Poland after 24 February 2022 and plan to stay here longer and work in Poland. That is why we want to help these people adapt to the conditions on the Polish labour market. As part of the project, we are launching a free consultation point for people from Ukraine and offering them assistance in legalising their employment and stay in Poland. Assistance includes the nostrification of documents and the provision of a safe place of residence (tenancy with a social guarantee) in the months before the expiry of the legality of residence and work, i.e. before 24 August 2023. Support is provided by a specialist in legal residence and labour law.
Summary of project results
On the day of submitting the project, according to various data, there were over 3,000 people from Ukraine in Toruń. Almost 7,000 of them obtained UKR status here. By launching a dedicated consultation and assistance point at the Social Intermediation Agency, the project responded to a number of problems. First of all, it provided space and staff to directly support people with UKR status in the process of legalizing their stay. Due to legal regulations, the project implementation time coincided with the key period for many people to submit applications for legalization of stay and to look for legal grounds to extend their stay in Poland after the expiry of the UKR status. A person from Ukraine who has registered his/her stay in Poland and intends to stay here after 18 months from the date of entry should submit an application for temporary residence for the next 3 years. The application may be submitted no earlier than 9 months from the date of entry into Poland, but no later than March 4, 2024. Moreover, the letter of the Commissioner for Human Rights of November 29, 2022 raised doubts raised by the analysis of the draft amendment to the Act: "They relate to to the change providing for a 30-day deadline for submitting an application for a PESEL number, counted from the date of arrival. Failure to submit the application would result in the stay becoming illegal." The basic issue for war refugees and their employers is the certainty that the former''s stay is legal .
Massive submission of applications for residence permits by war refugees may lead to complete paralysis of voivodeship offices dealing with matters of legalization of stay. The Ombudsman also pointed out that the status obtained by people from Ukraine after arrival has a strictly defined time frame. Therefore, postponing the prospect of applying for such a permit, which guarantees the legality of stay even for several years, will extend the period of uncertainty in which those who want to stay in Poland longer remain.
As part of the project:
- 1 consultation and assistance point was opened for people from Ukraine who were looking for a job and wanted to legalize their stay; open from Monday to Friday from 9am-5pm.
- 147 people from Ukraine received direct support from specialists at the Social Intermediation Agency; Currently, there are over 500 people registered in our database. The support included, among others: on:
Help in looking for a job or additional work;
Searching for information and referral to vocational courses, internships, professional activation projects, Polish language courses, educational classes for children, integration classes for older people, language projects;
Searching for an apartment, room, free accommodation for elderly people;
Career counseling: consultations on temporary residence, establishing a sole proprietorship, unregistered, legalization;
Assistance in completing applications for a temporary residence card, a permanent residence card, or a Pole''s card;
- a hotline was run in SAP; (+48) 512 205 082 for people from Ukraine;
- we organized an information and press meeting attended by, among others, Emic Foundation, Labor Office, OWES, "Kujawsko-Pomorski Dom Ukrainski" Association;
- 10 people took part in joint workshops dedicated to anti-discrimination and human rights activities organized at the Social Intermediary Agency;
- in the same period, we launched a complementary project: Social Intermediation Agency - information point, financed from the Aid Fund, under which an adaptation assistant was employed;
- since August, we have launched a complementary project "Social Intermediation Agency - in the neighborhood (Ashoka, Fund Tu), in which we provide, among others: psychological assistance, development workshops;
Thanks to the project, the durability of dedicated support for people from Ukraine provided by the Social Intermediation Agency was ensured. Two more projects were also launched, complementary and at the same time maintaining the durability of activities until the extended period of legal stay (March 2024). Thanks to this, we can continue our activities and support the 500 people who are already in our database and include others. Thanks to the project, we were included in the conference "CSOs at the forefront of the refugee support" (Warsaw, November 13-15), where we could share our experience and add our voice to the recommendations for funders. On December 14, we held a consultation meeting in Toruń with representatives of municipal and provincial institutions and people from the third sector regarding integration and deepening cooperation for the social inclusion of people from Ukraine. At SAP, we also support a young organization founded by our beneficiaries and we guide a group of enterprising people from Ukraine towards establishing a social economy entity.
The management board also introduced an anti-mobbing and child protection policy in the organization.