On Monday 11 June, the European Commissioner for Culture and Youth, Tibor Navracsics, officially launched the DiscoverEU pilot project (see EUROPE 12014), which will enable at least 15,000 young Europeans aged over 18 to travel free of cost throughout Europe from summer 2018 when they are given their Interrail passes.
The Interrail pass is a train ticket that allows for travel on the European railway networks outside of the rail pass holder’s country of residency.
Participants will be able to travel over a 30 day period and visit up to 4 different countries.
Expressing his optimism about the fact that these 15,000 free travel passes will help promote youth participation as well as the image of the EU, Mr Navracsics explained that “DiscoverEU offers an excellent opportunity to young people to explore Europe through a personal journey in a way that no book or documentary can”.
The same feeling was expressed by the Social Democrat group (S&D) in the European Parliament. Istvan Ujhelyi (S&D, Hungary) said “I ask all the governments to support the promotion of the programme”. The MEP was also keen to highlight the role played by Parliament in putting this issue on the agenda and the outcome of this project.
Procedure taking shape
Mr Navracsics clarified a number of persisting grey areas in the candidate selection procedure.
Young people can submit their candidacies on the Internet between 12-26 June. They will have to provide a detailed description of their travel plans, answer five questions about the European Heritage Year, European youth policy and the upcoming European Parliament elections. Their answers will be used as a basis for selecting candidates.
They will mainly travel by train but possibly by coach and, exceptionally, by aeroplane or ferry in the case those living on islands.
The passes will be distributed on a quota basis per member state and, possibly, reintroduced, if these quotas are not reached.
Questioned about the default sociological criterion that could lead to granting free passes to young people who had the ability to pay, the Commissioner pointed out that DiscoverEU was just a pilot project and in the future, it could not be ruled out that selection criteria that took into account income will be added. (Original version in French by Mathieu Solal, trainee)