Myles,
Yes, people are constantly heading off to Milan and Paris at the moment, not so much the other European bases. However, this is because so many new captains are coming from these bases and heading to LGW. Again, the number of command courses will rapidly slow down in the next couple of years which will slow down the recruitment and therefore movement to European bases.
If you are lucky enough to get into easy after finishing your training then plan on being on flexicrew for at least 2 years on much lower terms than currently exist. I'm pretty sure by then the management will have come up with ingenious ways of lowering terms in the European bases too so moving to them on a permanent contract will become less attractive.
My last point is that since starting flying training the terms and conditions have dropped at a jaw dropping rate. I am constantly amazed at how low the conditions have become.
Believe me, it becomes very tiresome losing 15% of your monthly pay when a nice long 4 sector day gets replaced with an AMS. It is impossible to plan because your monthly pay will vary so much even after your roster is published because of all the changes.
Sounds negative? Yep, this is the reality....