Has the UK government finally shown it is ready and willing to negotiate a youth mobility scheme with the EU?
A report in The Times last week – swiftly denied, with an almost audible groan from official sources, but they would, wouldn’t they? – suggests that a plan to improve Britain’s working relationship with Brussels is afoot, one that would allow tens of thousands of young EU citizens to live and work in the UK for up to three years.
Despite demands for a post-Brexit reset, the Starmer government has so far refused to entertain any such a move on youth mobility, which has long been seen as a sticking point in its attempts to broker a compromise.
But even more notable than the suggestion British negotiators have now tabled this idea is that the suggestion has received pretty much no pushback.
The move would be hugely significant for 18- to 30-year-olds in the UK and businesses as it would open up flows of cultural exchange, life-changing opportunities, a large pool of adaptive young labour, setting up lively new networks of friendship and work-links for future generations.
Normally, this kind of pro-European engagement would set the tabloid press and die-hard Brexit politicians gnashing their teeth all over print, radio, television and social media. So far, there has been nothing.
If the government wanted to “fly a kite” to test Brexiteer reactions to a UK-EU youth mobility visa, it was a very successful test flight. Even Nigel Farage chose to rage instead about “the Brexit betrayal” on the alignment of food standards.
It is very clear why: no political party has anything to gain by opposing the youth mobility scheme. So the government can, and should, now be bold. For the sake of our youth, our economy, our European engagement, and just hope for a better future.
The huge risk to the government is actually now in not doing it. Or even proceeding in a mealy-mouthed way that atrophies any vigour.
They are opening themselves up to getting stuck in the mud with their “reset”, demoralising support in their voters, and even getting outflanked. Many observers are getting extremely frustrated at a motionless government with the ball at their feet and a wide-open goal.
Let’s look at the polling. Earlier this month, YouGov asked a sample of 4,505 adults whether they would support such a mutual scheme for 18- to 30-year-olds. The result was 67 per cent in support versus 17 in opposition. But here’s the thing: within Labour voters, it was 86 per cent support versus 6 per cent oppose.
Labour has virtually no support to lose from taking this position. Conversely, they have a lot to gain from Conservative voters, who have an astonishing 59 per cent support for it. Even 34 per cent of Reform voters support it.
A new megapoll of nearly 15,000 people, by think tank Best for Britain, shows near-identical findings – with 66 per cent of those surveyed for and 18 per cent opposed. Furthermore, their constituency-by-constituency breakdown shows greater than 2:1 support for it in Remain heartlands such as Farage’s seat, Clacton, and Lee Anderson’s Ashfield. What more do you want?
I am quite surprised that the Conservatives, or even Reform, have not spotted the opportunity to move on this in order to steal momentum and leave the Labour government looking flat-footed. Given that the government absolutely needs to do it anyway – to get the growth hit and do any substantial deal with the EU – right-wing parties could have first-mover advantage.
In fact, some Conservatives already have. The Conservative European Forum has already advocated for the youth mobility scheme, backed up by two sitting Conservative MPs, Sir Roger Gale and David Simmonds. Even “Brexit hardman” Steve Baker said this month that he would be “all in favour” of such a scheme and that it would be “a gesture of goodwill”. The former Wycombe MP even took a swipe at politicians “trying to be Brexit-ier than Nigel Farage”, which he called “a disaster”. Again, the resistance to youth mobility is imagined and just not there.
So how would it work? In The Times piece, there was talk of an annual cap on numbers at a preposterously low level of 70,000. It reeks of timidity. No cap is actually needed at all, and here is why: so long as you have a mechanism to encourage, maintain and check the mutual uptake on both UK and EU sides, then the outgoing youth and incoming youth balance to net zero immigration on the scheme.
If you have a special visa for this, you can keep a running counter on the numbers both ways and also include mechanisms to upregulate or downregulate mechanisms to stimulate youth to pick it up. A sensible government would make a thing of having a big drive in disadvantaged communities to give their youth life-changing experiences and then heartily brag about doing so.
Keeping an incoming-outgoing youth balance then also negates the need for any NHS surcharge for the incoming youth because, beyond the fact that young people hardly cost health services, the health burden for each other’s youths will cost the UK and EU as near equally as makes no real difference.
All such discussions are entirely open because the EU has never negotiated a scheme like this with any country before. So, we in the UK are in a hugely privileged place to be creative with solutions. It is carte blanche, and the government should start talking about it that way – before everyone else beats them to the framing.
Dr Mike Galsworthy is Chair of European Movement UK
