‘Rule-bending’ needed for devolved nations to stay in Erasmus+

The prospect of Scotland and Wales staying in the Erasmus+ student exchange scheme, after the UK as a whole has left the programme, would “require some serious rule-bending”, a policy expert has said.

Thomas Jørgensen, senior policy coordinator at the European University Association, said that the trade and cooperation agreement between the European Union and the UK was “not at all geared to separate treatment for regions”.

“If it is at all possible, it will require some serious rule-bending from what we know,” he said, when asked whether there were any mechanisms in place that would allow the devolved nations to separately seek association.

“To begin with, the last we saw of the regulation – the final version is agreed, but not public – talked about countries, and seen from the EU, the country is the UK.”

Dr Jørgensen added that a “more concrete and realistic option” was that the UK as a whole and its devolved nations “lobby for flexible treatment of the UK as a partner country” in Erasmus+ “so that UK institutions can participate in parts of the programme, at times, at their own cost, which might then be covered by the Welsh or Scottish government”.

“The window for defining this is still open. Then in the long run, the UK can still change its mind and seek to associate to the whole programme,” he said.

The UK government decided to leave the Erasmus+ programme, after the two sides were unable to agree on the cost of the country’s continued membership.

Earlier this week, the Scottish and Welsh governments confirmed that they were exploring how they might be able to participate in Erasmus+. In the meantime, they said that they should be given any replacement funding for the scheme from the UK government in the first instance “to allow us to exercise our right to deliver educational services within our respective nations”.

They added that the UK’s proposed alternative to Erasmus+, the Turing scheme, was “a lesser imitation of the real thing”.

Richard Lochhead, Scotland’s further and higher education minister, said that he had engaged in productive talks with Mariya Gabriel, European Commissioner for innovation, research, culture, education and youth, to explore the idea of continued participation.

A spokeswoman for the European Commission said that it had received a letter signed by a number of MEPs on the subject of the constituent nations of the UK associating to Erasmus+ programmes and “it would not be right to pre-empt the content of that response”.

ellie.bothwell@timeshighereducation.com