Brussels, 14/11/2007 (Agence Europe) - The need to promote the quality of mobility of the students of Europe was stressed on Thursday by the Luxembourg MEP Erna Hennicot-Schoepges, during the debate held at the European Parliament by her group (EPP-ED) on its own initiative, and in partnership with the university foundation “Campus Europae”. A delegation of students, who came from all over Europe, spoke to members of the Parliament, to European Commissioner Jan Figel, who is responsible for education and training, and to the university authorities, in order to raise the difficulties met by students who would be candidates for mobility. Ms Hennicot-Schoepges welcomed the progress made to facilitate this mobility, whilst expressing a certain amount of frustration at the lack of a regulatory framework to allow students to move more freely within the European Union and, more particularly, to deal with the problems of funding. Encouraging results are nonetheless visible from negotiations underway with the Council and the Commission on the “education” plank of the European Technology Institute (ETI) and, more particularly, on the question of the mobility of bursaries for researchers and students, on which the Parliament has taken position favourably, she stressed. Those taking part, and Doris Pack (EPP-ED, Germany) in particular, welcomed the success of the Erasmus programme, but criticised the fact that it benefits only an elite of students, leaving aside students of humbler means, particularly those from the new member states. Funds are indeed limited and do not give them the financial opportunity to study abroad. In order to face up to this problem, Ms Pack suggested a combination of various sources of funding: national, European and, in particular, funding from the private sector. Commissioner Figel, for his part, stressed the close link between the Bologna process, which aims to establish a “European area of higher education” and the Lisbon process, the objective of which is to turn the EU into the “most competitive knowledge-based economy of the world”, as education is a vital condition for employment after studies. Apart from being a door to the world of employment, studies are also a source of personal and cultural enrichment when they allow young people to study abroad. Quoting the Luxembourg model, which provides for the complete and unconditional mobility of aid and bursaries, the Commission hoped that mobility could become the rule rather than the exception throughout Europe, instead of being limited to certain students. (I.L.)