Cameron: Nobody knows about our post-Brexit study abroad program

Nobody knows about the UK's post-Brexit study abroad program because the government is not promoting it enough, the Foreign Secretary has suggested.

Britain has refused an offer to continue participating in the European Union's Erasmus student exchange program after Brexit and replaced it with the Turing program.

Lord David Cameron insisted that the Turing program is more generous than Erasmus in many ways, but that fewer people realize it.

He revealed that one of his own children, who is currently deciding where to go to college, had never heard of the project.

In a question-and-answer session with students at Astana University in Kazakhstan during his five-day diplomatic blitz in Central Asia, the foreign minister said: I think (we) are not doing not sufficiently promoting Turing.

I think everyone knew Erasmus, no one knows Turing. And I think what the Ministry of Foreign Affairs needs to do, as well as the Ministry of Education and other ministries, is to promote it.

I want every child to go to school…I have an 18 year old who is currently deciding where to go. He had never heard of Turing. He had heard about Erasmus and how it was no longer available.

I think we need to advertise it more because, actually, it's in many ways a more generous program because it allows you to go to universities around the world.

Erasmus covers internships across the bloc and some outside countries that pay to be part of the program, while the Turing program announced by Boris Johnson offers internships across the world.

But analysis of the first year of the new program revealed a number of problems, including students forced to abandon their studies because places were confirmed too late while others did not receive funding.

The IFF Research report suggests that four in five universities (79%) experienced difficulties with the application process.

Lord Cameron said he believed Turing was the right approach because of its broader reach as well as greater access for students from less advantaged backgrounds.

If we come back to that, and of course it's an option, it's still an option, you could always re-enter the Erasmus program, but being rational for a while, given that a lot more Europeans were going to universities British than British. Going to European universities and then returning to Erasmus would cost us a lot more money without benefiting more British students, he added.

Lord Cameron resigned as Prime Minister the morning after millions of Britons voted to leave the EU, having led the campaign to remain in the bloc.

The former Conservative leader made headlines earlier this week when he suggested he would like the UK to strike a migrant return deal with France, but that it is not possible due to the current situation.

The comments were widely seen as contradicting the government's line that a deal with an EU country is not possible because the bloc would insist that Britain accept a quota of migrants as part of the deal, although Lord Cameron later denied he meant Brexit was to blame. lack of cross-Channel agreement.

He said the Dublin Regulation, the EU rules that allowed member states to transfer asylum seekers to other countries in the bloc, no longer existed, whether you were in or outside the EU. the EU, and that the government had studied innovative solutions such as the expulsion of Rwanda. diagram instead.

Lord Cameron made the remarks as he traveled through Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan and Mongolia as part of a diplomatic bid to strengthen trade and security ties with the Central Asia.

Becoming the first foreign minister to visit Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Turkmenistan, the minister said he held constructive talks with leaders across the region.

Following a bilateral meeting with his Kazakh counterpart Murat Nurtleu, he said his message to Central Asia was that Britain wanted to be here and so you had the choice to partner with Western countries as well as 'to Russia and China, who are competing for influence in the region. .

During the trip, the foreign minister helped prepare a traditional Uzbek plov dish and entered a Turkmen yurt as he sought to forge closer cultural and trade ties with Central Asia.

Among the announcements he made were a new program to promote the English language in Central Asia, as well as doubling the amount of funding for Chevening scholarships, which allow foreigners to study in Britain.

He traveled to Mongolia on Thursday, where he met with the country's foreign minister, Battsetseg Batmunkh, at the foreign ministry.

In a room full of local media, Lord Cameron told him that the UK wanted to be one of your best neighbours.

We admire the journey you have made as a country, he said. We are grateful to celebrate your democracy and your success.