The Hidden Cost of Working Abroad: Romanian Migrants Face Squalor in the Netherlands

The building in Van Noremborghstraat, 's-Hertogenbosch, where Florin Lincan lived for two months

In the gray light of early morning, Florin Lincan stood shivering outside the bathroom door. He was bleary-eyed and waiting. The line stretched down the dimly lit hallway, each person impatiently shifting from foot to foot. Every morning was the same: a race against time as all his Romanian housemates queued up for their turn. The toilet - shared by everyone on the floor - wasn’t just a necessity. Getting inside felt like a battle. 

Lincan, a 27-year-old Romanian who came to the Netherlands in July 2024 to work in a slaughterhouse, is just one of many forced to endure degrading conditions in order to earn a meager living. His two months at RMS Reyhan Employment Agency (RMS), one of the largest in the country, reflect the struggles faced by thousands of Romanian migrants. For these workers, the dream of a better life has turned into a daily struggle against dehumanizing conditions.

Numbering around 40,000, Romanian laborers represent the second-largest migrant community after Poles in the Netherlands. Yet, while they fuel the Dutch economy and make up a significant portion of its migrant labor force, the living standards they face are often dire. Damp, cold water, no electricity, cockroaches, and overcrowding - the conditions in the houses managed by employment agencies paint a chilling picture. 

Inhumane Conditions

“During my first week in the Netherlands,” recounts Lincan, “we were eight people living in a house near Utrecht. The bathroom was unusable. We used a pump in the courtyard to drink water and had to find discreet spots in the garden to relieve ourselves.

The sockets didn’t work; there was no electricity inside. To charge my mobile phone, I would walk five kilometers to a shop where I would wait for an hour.

After a week, they moved us to a three-storey building in the center of ‘s-Hertogenbosch,” he said. “The stairwells were littered with vomit, cigarette butts, leftover joints, and toilet paper. In the kitchen, cockroaches roamed the countertop, and the bathroom was shared by the entire floor. I had to wake up two hours early and wait in line for the toilet.”

"I put up with it because I desperately needed the money, but it felt like we were less than human"

A 23-year-old seasonal worker in agriculture, Andreea Lăutaru, had similar experiences with RMS. “I had to sleep on the tiled floor of a bathroom in a house in Berlicum, next to a man I didn't know,” she said. “It was disgusting, with mold everywhere and no hot water. At night, we could hear rats scratching in the walls. I put up with it because I desperately needed the money, but it felt like we were less than human.”

Who is responsible?

Even with mounting complaints, employment agencies shirk responsibility. Tolunay Reyhan, the manager of the family-run RMS, defends his company, despite its reputation for poor worker housing and violent practices. "We have a housing capacity for almost 2,000 employees. I don’t know whom you spoke to. But if there are cockroaches, it’s because people don’t clean up after themselves. You don’t want to know how much I pay for electricity for each house, because Romanians like to stay at 30 degrees with all the windows open," he told The Glass Room on the telephone.

Despite the Migrant Workers Protection Taskforce, established by Dutch politician Emile Roemer in 2020, to improve the working and living conditions of migrant workers in the Netherlands, progress has remained slow due to inconsistent enforcement.

The only benchmark for agencies claiming to offer decent accommodation is holding a Stichting Normering Flexwonen (SNF) certification. Issued by a private institution established by trade unions and employers' organizations, this certification aims to set minimum standards for migrant workers' housing. 

The value of it is obvious from how much most agencies desire to display it. Some, like SVK Personeeldiensten, exploit this by misleading workers with the SNF logo on their website without actually holding the certificate. 

In contrast, RMS does possess a genuine one. Informed about the difficulties faced by Lincan and Lăutaru, SNF initiated a personal investigation. “We never provide specific information about locations and inspection results,” they said, adding, “However, we take these kinds of signals very seriously.”

The cases of Lincan and Lăutaru are just two examples out of dozens of others. While the situation is not much different elsewhere, most Romanians remain silent, wary of the risk of violent eviction if they complain too loudly.