At its sitting on Wednesday, 22 July, the Government approved a bill that changes a rule which for years has put unmarried families at a disadvantage. Today, an uninsured woman may receive maternity benefit calculated from her husband’s insured income. If the parents are not married, that possibility does not exist — even if the child’s father works legally and pays contributions. The Government’s press release announces that the benefit will also be calculable from the father’s income, whatever the parents’ civil status.
Three essential things do not, however, appear in the release, but are to be found in the text of the bill and its explanatory note: the measure enters into force only in a year and a half, the procedure for claiming the money does not yet exist, and the Ministry of Finance opposed it.
What changes, exactly
Law No. 289/2004 today recognises three categories of women entitled to maternity benefit: insured women, registered unemployed women, and the wife supported by an insured husband. The bill adds a fourth, through a new paragraph:
Women who do not fall within the situations provided for in paragraphs (4), (6) and (7) shall benefit from the right to maternity benefit for the entire period of the maternity leave, which is paid after the birth of the child, on condition that the child’s father confirms a contribution period specified in paragraph (1) or (2). Bill 1032/MMPS/2025, the new Article 6 paragraph (7¹) of Law No. 289/2004
The condition at the end is the one that counts. The father must have at least three years of contribution period, or — if he has less — nine months out of the last 24. The benefit is calculated from his insured income, at 100% of the calculation base, for 126 days of leave; 140 days in the case of a complicated birth or twins, and 182 days for three or more foetuses.
One practical difference is worth keeping in mind. The general rule provides that the benefit is granted in full at the 30th week of pregnancy. For the new category, the text says explicitly that the money is paid after the birth of the child. The same sum, later.
The bill amends eight laws in all, among them the Labour Code, and extends from one year to three years the time limit within which discrimination may be claimed. It is not a decision already in force, but an organic-law bill sent to Parliament.
The condition everything depends on: acknowledgement of paternity
This is where the trap lies, one worth knowing for any family in this situation. The fact that the father’s name appears on the birth certificate does not automatically mean that paternity is legally acknowledged.
According to the procedure published by the Public Services Agency, when the parents are not married to each other, the details about the father are entered in the birth record on the basis of the joint declaration of the parents establishing paternity, of the declaration of one parent with the consent of the guardianship authority, or of a court ruling. If none of these exists, the father’s surname is written after the mother’s, and his first name as indicated by the mother. Such an entry does not produce the legal effects of acknowledgement of paternity. Acknowledgement of paternity, however, opens more than the right to this benefit: it legally establishes the tie between father and child, with lasting effects both ways — reciprocal parental rights and obligations, and the duty to maintain the child until adulthood (Family Code, articles 58 and 74).
The joint declaration of paternity is filed with the territorial civil status office, is free of charge, is processed within at most three working days and may be filed even before the child is born. It is the only step that can be taken from now, under today’s rules.
The bill also provides for a recovery mechanism: if a woman has already received the benefit calculated from her own income because the father’s details were missing, the benefit may be reviewed, on condition that the father’s details reach the information system of the National Social Insurance House (CNAS) within 12 months of the end of the maternity leave. The text does not specify who triggers the review — the institution on its own initiative, or the mother on request.
The calculation for Ungheni district
The explanatory note estimates 2,248 beneficiaries a year nationally, with an average amount of 74.827,30 lei per person — a payment for the entire period of the leave, not a monthly sum. The total cost would be around 169 million lei in 2028.
Ungheni district accounted for 732 of the country’s 22,108 births in 2025, that is 3.31%. Applying this share to the national estimate gives around 74 women a year from the district and some 5.5 million lei. The figure is an estimate obtained by scaling the Government’s data, not a measurement: it assumes that eligibility is spread evenly across the country, an assumption that is not guaranteed in a district where 68% of births are in villages.
The only measured district figure in the whole file is the number of births. The indicator on births outside marriage is not broken down by district in the National Bureau of Statistics database — it exists only nationally, split between urban and rural areas.
Two percentages that do not match
The Government’s release says that „around 19% of children are born outside marriage”, a figure attributed to the Public Services Agency and consistent with the National Bureau of Statistics series for 2018–2024, where the 2024 value is 19.0%.
For 2025, however, the BNS published an almost double figure: 61.5% of children were born within marriage, and 7.8 thousand, that is 35.3%, outside it. The series shows 18.2% in 2022, 18.3% in 2023, 19.0% in 2024 and 35.3% in 2025.
Neither the BNS releases nor the table metadata contain a methodological note on this difference, and the series is not marked as broken. The two figures are therefore each to be read with its own year, and the difference remains without a public explanation.
What the Ministry of Finance says
The part missing altogether from the release is that the bill received a negative opinion from the Ministry of Finance. Twice.
Does not support the bill, given that it provides for significant additional financial spending of approximately 170 million lei, for which no source of coverage has been identified. Ministry of Finance, opinion of 6 February 2025, quoted in the summary of objections to the bill
In a second opinion, of 20 January 2026, the ministry added that the measure comes on top of „a substantial deficit attested annually in the State Social Insurance Budget” and that including new spending without coverage „will further accentuate its unsustainability, and the burden of the additional spending will inevitably fall on the state budget”.
The bill’s authors responded on two lines: that transposing a European obligation cannot be refused on budgetary grounds, and that the date of entry into force resolves precisely this problem, since it „allows the necessary financial resources to be planned and allocated within the budget process”. This is also where it becomes clear why the deadline was pushed back: the earlier version of the same bill, from December 2025, provided for entry into force on 1 January 2027. The version approved now says 1 January 2028.
What can be done now, and where
Until 2028 today’s rules remain unchanged. The step that can be taken at any time, from now on, is the joint declaration of paternity at the civil status office — free of charge, within three working days, possible even before the birth.
The procedure through which the benefit will actually be claimed for the new category has not yet been written. The text of the bill provides for no forms or documents, and the act that today governs the way benefits are established and paid is Government Decision No. 108 of 2005, which the Government is to amend within six months of the law’s publication. At present, maternity benefit is established automatically, without an application, on the basis of the medical certificate transmitted electronically by the medical institution, with an examination period of 15 calendar days. For a mother without an employment relationship, this mechanism cannot work in the same way.
The institution where the documents will be filed in the district, once the law enters into force, is the Ungheni Territorial Social Insurance Office, str. George Meniuc 8, open Monday to Thursday between 08.00 and 17.00 and on Friday until 15.00, with online appointments at servicii.gov.md.
This article is based on the Government’s press release of 22 July 2026, on the full text of bill 1032/MMPS/2025 and its explanatory note, on the earlier version of the same bill from December 2025, on Law No. 289/2004, on the paternity acknowledgement procedure published by the Public Services Agency, and on the data of the National Bureau of Statistics. The 3.31% figure and the estimate of around 74 beneficiaries a year in Ungheni district belong to the newsroom and were obtained by relating the district’s births to the national total and applying this share to the number of beneficiaries estimated by the Government. There are no public data on births outside marriage at district level.