A survey reveals that a growing number of Ukrainian refugees in Berlin plan on making the German capital their permanent home.

An increasing number of Ukrainian refugees in Berlin plan on staying permanently, according to a survey conducted at the Tegel emergency shelter, in which 65% of respondents said they would like to settle in the German capital. This is a significant shift from a year ago, when most people planned to return to Ukraine after the war.

„We see that the tide has turned,” said Mark Seibert, president of the State Agency for Refugee Affairs (LAF), Remix News reported, citing the German newspaper Welt. He added that this is evident from the demand for language courses and the long queue of Ukrainians at job centres seeking employment.

Since the start of the Russia-Ukraine war in 2022, tens of thousands of Ukrainians have sought asylum in Berlin, with an estimated 50,000-60,000 Ukrainians currently living in the city. Approximately 9,000 of them are living in state-run accommodation managed by the LAF, around 3,000 are at the Tegel emergency shelter, while others have found private accommodation or have been taken in by local residents.

Ukrainians in Germany enjoy a different legal status from other asylum seekers. They can work and have access to healthcare, social benefits and language courses. The trend in Berlin can be observed across the country, and successive annual surveys show that newcomers are increasingly choosing to stay in Germany indefinitely.

Many circumvent the system

Last year, a Ukrainian family amassed 40,000 euros support in Germany, despite living in their home country. The labour office was consistently paying them around €3,200 a month in citizenship benefits, rent and heating allowances, the Focus portal reported. The family of four quickly secured a flat and a spot in a creche, a privilege often elusive for local Germans.

After it became clear that the war would persist, the family returned to their home in western Ukraine in early 2023. They came back to Schleswig-Holstein in the winter and pocketed German taxpayers’ money in the same manner even during their time a home in Ukraine. The deception was discovered when, on their winter return, the family sought a place in a German school for their eldest child.

The Federal Labour Agency confirmed to Focus that it is not impossible to exploit the welfare system in this way. Although Ukrainian refugees are legally on par with German citizens in these matters, some of the control mechanisms are not rigorously enforced.

Officially, one can only qualify for such benefits if their assets are below €40,000. However, while this is easily verifiable for Germans, for Ukrainians, it operates on a self-declaration basis. The authorities can only verify the information provided as „data” by the Ukrainians, Steffi Ebert, the head of the employment centre in Schmalkalden-Meiningen, Thuringia, told Focus.

However, in the case of the family in western Ukraine, the primary factor leading to taxpayers unwittingly funding unjustified benefits was not the absence of assets control. Instead, it stemmed from a breakdown in communication between state institutions. The labor office was unaware that the boy had discontinued attending day care. While such checks are not standard practice, they are routinely carried out by authorities. However, since the onset of the Russia-Ukraine war, the influx of arrivals to Germany has overwhelmed its offices and authorities. Consequently, it is not uncommon for some individuals to exploit the system and receive significant funds, essentially from German taxpayers.

According to official statistics, approximately 700 thousand Ukrainian refugees are receiving national assistance in Germany, with the majority of them being unemployed. At that time, only around 19 percent of Ukrainians were employed. Matthias Jendricke, chairman of the Nordhausen district council in Thuringia, described the situation as „disappointing.”

The social democratic politician initially believed that integrating Ukrainians into the labor market would be easier compared to other refugees. In the weeks following the Russian attack, he even arranged for buses to transport Ukrainian refugees from Berlin to his region, addressing an urgent labor shortage. However, ‘things have turned out completely wrong,’ with only a fraction of the refugees expressing interest in entering the labour market.

Joachim Walter of the CDU shares a similar perspective. As the county council president in the Tubingen district of Baden-Württemberg, he notes that the willingness of Ukrainian refugees to engage in work has been significantly diminished by the assistance provided.