This report, from the cross-party, cross-industry UK Trade and Business Commission (UKTBC) delivers 17 substantive recommendations for the UK Government, and our EU partners on how we can make a youth experience scheme a reality.
The UK Government and EU Commission made great strides towards improving the UK-EU relations at the UK-EU Summit in May 2025. Among new pledges on energy, food standards and defence cooperation, negotiators also laid the groundwork for a Youth Experience Scheme, a policy designed to reconnect young people in Europe and the UK and signal a new era of partnership.
In practice, the scheme will provide huge opportunities for young people in both the UK and EU, allowing future applicants to live, work and study in either country for a limited period of time. In the UK however, the Youth Experience Scheme negotiations will span a number of domestically sensitive policy areas.
While the UK’s existing Youth Mobility Schemes have been reducing net migration to the UK in recent years, migration flows are notoriously difficult to predict. Both agreement on a cap in numbers, and details of the deal will define whether the scheme is a policy success for future beneficiaries, and a political success for the UK Government.
Agreement on the maximum duration of stay will be equally important, and the debate is likely to suffer from the same tensions as the arguments around the cap in numbers. The EU is pushing for the longest duration possible - citing four years as an example - when most of France's and Germany’s existing schemes are limited to one year.
In the UK, despite polling consistently well in principle (60% and above), support for the youth experience scheme drops by 10% if the scheme lasts longer than two years. Though support remains above 50% even for a four-year scheme, polling suggests that a scheme lasting longer than two years could come at the expense of the support of some key voter groups in the UK electorate.
Furthermore, the Youth Experience Scheme cannot be considered in isolation to university tuition fees, and its impact on the UK’s struggling higher education sector more broadly. A scheme which allows EU students to be charged home fees, as is the EU’s ambition, would likely reverse the dwindling numbers of EU students studying in the UK. At the same time, it could exacerbate the financial struggles of some universities, or displace some British students.
Continuing to charge EU students international fees, as has been the case since Brexit, would avoid setting new precedents at a time when the UK Government is negotiating with multiple trade partners, and might improve the finances of a number of struggling UK universities. On the other hand, prohibitive tuition fees will continue the downward trend in EU students coming to the UK, further reducing the UK’s soft power and standing on the world stage - especially with eastern EU member states.
The UK’s reassociation to Erasmus+ will broaden the horizons and opportunities of many young Brits and will help reverse the sharp decline in the number of European students at UK universities. At a time when the UK’s public purse is under significant strain, the size of the financial contributions the UK will need to agree to could reduce the scope of the UK’s participation significantly.