Belgium Has No Data on Welfare Recipients Staying Abroad Longer Than a Month
The Belgian federal government has no central data on how many welfare recipients (leefloners) stay abroad for longer than one month per year, according to Het Laatste Nieuws. The revelation, prompted by a parliamentary question from Vlaams Belang MP Ellen Samyn, has reignited concerns about oversight of Belgium’s minimum income support system.
Nearly 174,000 people in Belgium currently receive the leefloon, a federal benefit administered locally by 565 separate Public Centres for Social Welfare (OCMWs). The vast majority of recipients live in Brussels or Wallonia, and approximately 70 percent hold Belgian nationality.
The Four-Week Rule
Under rules introduced in 2015 by then-Minister Willy Borsus, leefloners may stay abroad for a maximum of four weeks per calendar year while continuing to receive their benefit. Any longer stay requires an exception granted by the local OCMW. Recipients must notify their OCMW in advance of any foreign stay lasting a week or more.
Exceptions are granted only in specific cases — for example, someone temporarily traveling to their home country to care for a sick relative, or a student pursuing an internship or studies abroad. The rule is not intended to fund extended holidays.
No Central Registration
Samyn asked Federal Minister of Social Integration Anneleen Van Bossuyt (N-VA) for exact figures on how many leefloners stay abroad for a month or longer. The minister’s response: her federal services do not possess this data. No central registration exists of foreign stays, and all information is fragmented across the 565 individual OCMWs.
“I was very surprised when I read that answer,” Samyn told HLN. “The federal government finances the OCMWs. It is therefore incomprehensible that this administration does not centrally track whether our tax money is being spent correctly.”
Samyn argues the lack of oversight demonstrates systemic weaknesses. “In OCMWs with sufficient staff and a strong sense of responsibility, there will indeed be controls,” she said. “But that not every OCMW works that way was already shown by the large-scale scandal in Anderlecht last year. This seems like yet another case of a total lack of control: the system is as leaky as a sieve.”
The reference to Anderlecht is significant. A parliamentary working group concluded in May 2025 that the Anderlecht OCMW had committed “fraud with federal subsidies,” following an investigative report by the Pano program that exposed systematic irregularities, including payments to people who had no right to support.
Minister Defends Current System
Van Bossuyt pushed back against the criticism, arguing that the absence of a central database does not mean controls are lacking. “It is not because there is no central database that there is no control,” she countered.
The minister pointed to concrete enforcement: in 2025, local OCMWs suspended leefloon payments 861 times after discovering that recipients had stayed abroad too long. Her federal inspection service (POD MI) also reported no violations regarding foreign residence rules in all of 2025.
“The leefloon must make a dignified life possible or serve as a springboard to work,” Van Bossuyt said. “It is absolutely not a budget to spend months abroad. That is precisely why my inspection service strictly enforces the regulations. A scandal like the one in Anderlecht shows that something can go wrong in exceptional cases. That is why we are strengthening that inspection and will search more specifically for OCMWs where problems appear to exist.”
Her cabinet argues that OCMWs are local institutions best placed to assess individual cases, and that a central register would add administrative burden to already-overworked OCMW staff. The minister has no plans to create one.
Broader Anti-Fraud Measures
The debate comes amid a broader push against welfare fraud. In July 2026, the government approved a measure allowing OCMWs to hire detective agencies to investigate hidden foreign property and income. OCMWs will also gain access to the Central Contact Point of the National Bank to check foreign bank accounts, as Knack reported.
The issue of benefits recipients living abroad extends beyond the leefloon. Earlier this year, HLN reported that nearly 15,000 people receive Belgian sickness benefits while residing outside the country — a group that has grown by 58 percent in five years.
Political Implications
The story carries a strong Flemish-nationalist dimension. Samyn and her party argue for transferring OCMW financing from the federal level to the regions, contending that only 14 percent of leefloners live in Flanders while the majority reside in Brussels and Wallonia. “So that the Fleming no longer pays to fill the bottomless pit of Brussels and Wallonia,” Samyn said.
The Vlaams Belang press release on the matter called for a fundamental review of the system, while V-Nieuws reported on the growing pressure on OCMW staff as more people seek support.
What to Watch For
With Van Bossuyt ruling out a central register, the question remains whether the planned strengthening of the federal inspection service will be sufficient to close the monitoring gap. The 861 suspensions in 2025 represent only about 0.5 percent of all leefloners, and there is no way to know how many cases go undetected. As the government continues its anti-fraud push, the debate over how to balance local autonomy with federal oversight of welfare spending is likely to intensify.