Both Austria and the Walloon part of Belgium  announced this month a restriction of access of EU students to some of their programmes. As reported earlier in the ACA Newsletter – Education Europe, medical programmes at Austrian universities had recently been overrun by German students. In Wallonia, enrolment in some Veterinary Medicine programmes at universities was almost exclusively French, and enrolment in college courses (hautes écoles) in paramedical subjects showed similar trends.

Wallonia has now restricted the intake of foreign students from EU countries to 30 percent in the subject areas concerned, and Austria has guaranteed its own nationals (and foreigners who went to school in Austria) 75 percent of all places in Medicine. At the same time, Austria will increase the number of places in Medicine by 20 percent. It remains to be seen if these restrictions will hold water. According to European law, nationals of EU countries may not be treated differently from home students.