Companies, institutions or organisations implementing projects co-financed from European Funds in recent months are struggling with restrictions caused by the coronavirus pandemic. This situation concerns tens of thousands of undertakings. The Ministry of Development Funds and Regional Policy has prepared a special law that will facilitate their implementation and accounting and will allow the transfer of EU funds to the fight against coronavirus. The project of law was almost unanimously adopted by the Sejm and Senate. On the 17th of April the law was signed by the President Andrzej Duda.

The project of law on specific solutions supporting the implementation of operational programmes in connection with the occurrence of COVID-19 in 2020 has two objectives. The first is greater flexibility for beneficiaries who will be able to complete the projects they have started with the maximum possible efficiency and without financial loss. The second assumes that the available funds will be dedicated to fight coronavirus and reducing its negative effects on the economy.

Thanks to the special law on Funds, the EU money will not go into quarantine, but will continue to work for the Polish economy. I am glad that the package of solutions proposed by MFiPR was so well received by the parliamentarians and the president - said Małgorzata Jarosińska-Jedynak, the minister of Development Funds and Regional Policy.

Solutions proposed in  the special law

The project of law fits into government anti-crisis measures. Among others, it provides for the possibility of:

• recognition as eligible the expenditure for unrealised purposes due to a pandemic,
• extending the deadlines for submitting applications for competitions and the deadlines for completing and correcting applications, as well as for extending the deadline for submitting payment applications,
• introduction of an extraordinary procedure for project selection or receiving reductions in payment of receivables.
• It also introduces the possibility of remote work for project assessment committees, monitoring committees, and even controls and audits. In case it will not be possible to carry them “from behind the desk”, it will be possible to suspend them.
• It is also possible to extend the time limits in administrative proceedings or to suspend them and suspend the implementation of the decision. It is important for beneficiaries that justified breach of the conditions of the co-financing agreement will not result in exclusion from the possibility of receiving European funds in subsequent competitions.

When the law enters into force

The law is to enter into force the day after its announcement in the Journal of Laws, while the detailed solutions will apply retroactively from the 1st of February 2020. The law will be compatible and complementary to solutions prepared by the European Union in this respect, both in terms of the content of the solutions and the date from which they are to be applied.