It has emerged that EU member states are working with the UK on new proposals for a youth mobility scheme, after previous proposals by the European Commission were summarily rejected by Labour in April.
EU sources said the 27 nations hope to present workable negotiating points to Brussels in the coming weeks to help with expected talks on a restructuring of EU-UK relations, as sought by British Prime Minister Keir Starmer.
The new proposals would allow Starmer's team to make a fresh start on the issue, including potential counter-proposals, and are also thought to minimise political backlash from eurosceptics.
As the conversation took place in EU capitals, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said there was a lamentable decline in engagement with young people in the UK across the EU.
“Interactions in our societies, between Germans and Brits, have decreased significantly since Brexit and the coronavirus pandemic. We want to change that. If we know each other better, we can understand each other better,” Scholz told reporters on Wednesday.
Germany's ambassador to the UK, Miguel Berger, said it was crucial for people to understand that youth mobility has nothing to do with migration or freedom of movement. “We often hear the argument that youth mobility is freedom of movement, but this is based on visa requirements and time limits, and it's not. People leave the country after a set period of time,” he said.
Berger said giving young people the opportunity to work as baristas or au pairs, learn languages or do short-term training in each other's countries had created vital links that acted as a “glue” between European countries.
“What we want to foster is exchanges between our two societies, because at the end of the day, that is the backbone of our relationship – youth exchanges, sporting events, sister city partnerships – it cannot be a relationship based only on meetings between politicians,” he said.
The German ambassador to the UK said the placements across Europe for young people to work as au pairs were an important opportunity. Photo: Image source Salsa/Alamy
The European Commission surprised many in London and across the EU in April when it unveiled a proposed youth mobility scheme that would allow citizens to work or study for up to four years. The Labour Party rejected it within hours, fearing Brexit-related harm, and Downing Street rejected it the next day.
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This was subsequently seen as a hasty attempt to thwart talks that former British Chancellor Rishi Sunak had begun with six EU countries, including France and Germany, over a unilateral youth support plan.
Berger said that while the youth mobility scheme was a bilateral mandate, the EU27 had agreed to move forward as a union and they all wanted to see opportunities for young people restored.
“We know that all 27 EU member states have put at the top of their agenda the issue of creating more possibilities for young people,” he said, adding that the idea was that the system was for everyone, not just the “elite”.
Youth mobility programmes are already offered in many countries, including the UK, which has reciprocity schemes allowing young people from Australia, Canada, New Zealand, South Korea, Andorra, Japan, Monaco, Iceland, Uruguay and San Marino to stay for two years.
Alternatives to the Erasmus programme, which allows students to study on exchange across Europe, are being discussed at UK universities. Photo: Simon Duck/Alamy
University officials said youth exchanges, including the Erasmus programme, had a “return on investment” in the form of “soft power” that was not taken into account during Brexit. But they said the April proposal to include a four-year scheme allowing students to study in each other's countries while paying fees in their home country was not feasible and that youth exchanges were more likely to be politically viable if students were taken out of the equation.
A UK source said the system was unworkable because there has always been an “unbalanced flow of students”, with the number of EU citizens studying in the UK outnumbering the number of British students studying in the EU. This places a disproportionate financial burden on UK educational institutions, something that would be unacceptable in a youth mobility system. And even if EU citizens were allowed to study in the UK, there would still be other barriers, such as high visa costs and rising NHS surcharges.
One alternative to returning to Erasmus that is being considered at university level is increased financial support for EU students wishing to do exchange studies with universities in third countries.
Speaking after meeting with President Emmanuel Macron at the Elysee Palace in Paris, Starmer said they discussed plans to rebuild ties with France and the wider EU.
“We discussed, as you can imagine, the situation in Ukraine, the situation in the Middle East, bilateral issues on trade, defence and security, but also the broader restructuring that I would like to see in terms of relations not only with France but with the whole EU,” he said.
“These are topics we have discussed as part of our efforts to reset, rebuild and ensure that our number one mission of economic growth is at the heart of everything we do.”
