How an SNP minister plans to lobby Labour to re-join £12bn European exchange scheme

An SNP minister is planning to lobby the Labour government at Westminster to seek to re-join the Erasmus+ programme.

Graeme Dey, the further and higher education minister, told Scotland on Sunday he wants to “interrogate” the possibilities with counterparts in the UK government.

Erasmus+ provides funding for education, training and sport, with a particular focus on youth work.

Its current incarnation dates back to 2014, and its budget over seven years was £12billion.

More than 10,000 students in higher education in the UK participated in the 2018 application period for study placements abroad through Erasmus+, along with a further 8,172 students in work placements.

In the wake of Brexit, however, former Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced that the UK would no longer be participating, with the Westminster government instead to launch its own “Turing scheme”.

The Scottish Government has also been piloting a replacement initiative, but it is still to get off the ground.

Mr Dey has now signalled that he wants talks with the new Labour government to see if it will negotiate a return to Erasmus+.

It comes amid reports that Sir Keir Starmer’s government could agree to allow EU citizens under the age of 30 to live and work in the UK for up to three years, with a reciprocal arrangement for UK citizens.

Mr Dey said: "If you walked into each of our universities now and said, Erasmus, would you want to return? Overwhelmingly they would say, 'yes'.

"I know there was a deal negotiated, but as we've seen with our friends in Europe, it is possible to renegotiate. 

"I don't currently know what the view of the new UK government is. At minimum, I think you would want to see an improvement on the position currently.

"But of course we want to get back into those engagements. It has been deeply harmful, and not just for our colleges and universities, but our youth sector as well.

"Personally I've not yet had a conversation (with Labour ministers), but when we do have the conversation, I want to interrogate that among other things."

The SNP has been criticised for failing to deliver on its 2021 election manifesto to “create a Scottish programme of exchange to provide mobility and cooperation opportunities”.

The Welsh government has moved more quickly, unveiling and launching its own replacement scheme for Erasmus+ in 2022.

Mr Dey said: “We obviously ran the pilots last year. I was really taken by the impact, for a relatively small sums of money, it really did boost confidence as much as anything, it re-established relationships that have been damaged by Brexit.

"That was good. The college sector didn't participate as much as we would have hoped, although to be fair to them it was a pretty short lead in time.

"We've got a group looking at how we take that forward in terms of further pilots, what we've learned from that. 

"Clearly we would hope the incoming UK government might look differently at Erasmus participation, that is certainly an ask we have.”

A UK government spokesperson said: “We will work to reset the relationship with our European friends to strengthen ties, secure a broad-based security pact and tackle barriers to trade for the whole of the UK. 

“We also continue to work with the higher education sector to ensure our world leading universities continue to attract the brightest and best and support our economy, however we have no plans to re-join the Erasmus scheme."