Italy: Tuscany suffering lack of state funds for unaccompanied minors

Rome: The town councils of Italy’s Tuscany region have said that they are experiencing major difficulties assisting unaccompanied migrant minors due to the non-transfer of relevant state funding.

The non-transfer of state funds for the reception of unaccompanied migrant minors (MSNA) is creating major difficulties for the municipalities and healthcare entities of Italy’s Tuscany region.

This emerged during a September 11 meeting of the Tuscan branch of the National Association of Italian Municipalities (ANCI) with the chairperson and mayor of Poggibonsi, Susanna Cenni and Teramo mayor and ANCI immigration chief Gianguido D’Alberto as well as many representatives of town councils — from Pistoia to Florence, Livorno, and Lucca — and some healthcare entities.

As of July 31, the Tuscany branch of ANCI noted in a statement that Italy had received 16,875 unaccompanied migrant minors. Some 693 were in Tuscany, equal to 4.1 percent of the national total. For months, however, there has been a “serious lack of coverage of expenses incurred by the municipalities connected with MSNA reception under the responsibility of the national fund.”

The fund, of 115 million euros in 2025, is for the reimbursement in an emergency manner of expenditure by municipalities for MSNA taken into care outside of the national reception system.

“Between 2023 and 2024,” the statement said, “Tuscan municipalities recorded a lack of coverage of about 5 million euros, an amount that was widely exceeded in the first six months of 2025. Among the most penalised municipalities in Tuscany was Florence (over 2 million euros since 2023) and the Siena healthcare entity (over one million euros between 2023 and 2024).”

The Tuscany branch of ANCI has asked for government efforts and called on Tuscan MPs to work to this end so that the “problem is solved as soon as possible”.

Furthermore the Tuscan branch of ANCI will “get municipalities and the regional government more involved, both to urge a solution to the problem and to monitor it as well as to safeguard the continuance of the reception path and children’s rights.”

“In addition to reimbursing the money spent by the municipalities thus far, it will be necessary to broaden the capacity of the reception and integration system (SAI) for minors in order to enable all MSNAs to be taken into the care of a system that combines economic sustainability and good integration,” the statement added.