UK-EU Common Understanding Negotiations Debate

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Department: Northern Ireland Office

UK-EU Common Understanding Negotiations

Baroness Coussins Excerpts
Thursday 18th December 2025

(1 day, 9 hours ago)

Lords Chamber
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Baroness Coussins Portrait Baroness Coussins (CB)
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My Lords, can the Minister confirm that rejoining Erasmus+ will include schools for the purposes of trips and exchanges? If so, will His Majesty’s Government back this up by reintroducing group passports, so that we can put an end to the inordinate delays at the border when coach-loads of children have to get out of the bus to be individually checked?

Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent Portrait Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent (Lab)
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The noble Baroness raises an important point about how important travel is for our young people. We are negotiating bilateral agreements with countries. We have done the first of these for youth travel with France and I believe ongoing conversations are happening with Germany. I will reflect on her comments, but we are seeing positive moves in this direction.