Dam break: those who lost their homes in case of emergency will get an extra day off

Those who have lost their homes in natural or man-made emergencies are promised an additional paid day off. Such changes to the Labor Code were approved by the Cabinet of Ministers. They also plan to provide victims with an additional five days of unpaid leave. However, without monetary compensation and employment restoration programs, such measures cannot reduce the cumulative economic damage, experts stressed. How the amendments will work is in the Izvestia article.

What will be the new support measures?

In case of loss of housing or violation of living conditions in case of natural or man-made emergencies, Russians will be able to claim an additional paid day off. Such amendments to the Labor Code were approved by the government commission on legislative activity on Monday, December 22. This was reported to Izvestia by sources in the Cabinet of Ministers.

The initiative is aimed at strengthening the social protection of citizens facing the consequences of natural and man-made emergencies, said Vladimir Gruzdev, Chairman of the Board of the Russian Bar Association.

The amendments also enshrine the right of employees to leave without pay for up to five calendar days "to restore acceptable living conditions."

In order to receive additional days off and vacation, several conditions must be met.: actual residence in the property before an emergency, violation of living conditions, loss of property.

Changes to the Labor Code of the Russian Federation are necessary so that employees of various organizations have time to do everything necessary to restore documents, exercise their rights to receive support measures, and also have the opportunity to restore acceptable living conditions.

"This will ensure flexibility and purposefulness in the application of the new standards, taking into account the specifics of various types of emergency situations and the degree of damage caused to the employee," said Vladimir Gruzdev.

Additional guarantees could be used, for example, in Yakutia — an average of 24% of the total number of victims, as well as in the Kurgan, Omsk, Orenburg and Tyumen regions — 3-15%.

However, the Ministry of Economic Development, assessing the regulatory impact of the amendments, noted that the implementation of the provisions of the draft law would lead to significant additional costs for employers, as well as excessive administrative burden. The agency's review is available to Izvestia.

According to the ministry's estimates, additional expenses may amount to up to 276.8 million rubles annually, including 184.5 million rubles for weekend expenses and 92.3 million rubles for information costs. The calculation was based on the average salary in 2023, data on the number of able-bodied people, as well as the cost of one paid day off.

The office of Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Grigorenko did not fully agree with the conclusions of the Ministry of Economic Development. The ministry's assessment, they believe, does not take into account that "a day off is provided to an employee in return for a working day, the payment of which must be provided by the employer when forming the wage fund." In other words, the employer should already have the required funds.

How effective will the amendments be?

A natural emergency is a dangerous natural phenomenon, such as an earthquake, flood, hurricane, fire, tsunami, landslides, or drought. In March 2025, floods flooded hundreds of homes in 11 regions. Bashkiria and the Chelyabinsk region were in the zone of the greatest damage.

At the end of July 2025, an earthquake of magnitude 8.8 occurred in Kamchatka. It became the most powerful since 1952. Seven volcanoes woke up, and the island itself "migrated" to the southeast by two meters. In addition, the earthquake caused a tsunami.

A man—made emergency is a situation in which normal living conditions are disrupted as a result of an accident or disaster at an enterprise. For example, during a storm on December 15, 2024, two tankers crashed in the Kerch Strait, causing a leak of petroleum products into the sea. The consequences are still being eliminated. Since the beginning of the work, more than 185 thousand tons of polluted sand have been removed from the beaches of the Krasnodar Territory, Crimea and Sevastopol.

Now citizens are entitled to compensation and social guarantees for living and working in emergency zones. In the first nine months of 2025, the number of applications from citizens and organizations to the Ministry of Emergency Situations on the topic of "Emergency prevention and management" decreased by 32%, amounting to 6976 applications.

The new measure, providing an additional day off, is symbolic and disproportionate to the scale of the damage suffered by the victims, said Sofya Lukinova, head of the legal department at the VMT Consult analytical agency.

"One extra day of rest does not compensate for the loss of housing, forced expenses, or loss of income during an emergency," she said. — Other measures listed in the document are also primarily aimed at organizing work, rather than providing financial support.

They allow the employer to adjust the schedule more flexibly, redistribute the workload and formally take into account the participation of employees in flood relief, but they do not create stable financial guarantees for people.

Ekaterina Kosareva, managing partner of the company, added that the new measures do not solve the key problem — a sharp drop in the standard of living of the victims and the need for urgent restoration of lost property.

— In emergency situations, the main burden falls on households: loss of housing, rising debts, forced spending on reconstruction," the expert noted. — Against this background, labor measures in the form of additional days off or schedule changes do not have a noticeable impact on the economic situation of people.

Without direct monetary compensation and employment restoration programs, such measures cannot reduce the cumulative economic damage from an emergency, either for the population or for the regional economy, the experts concluded.