Insight
A hitchhiker’s guide to Galileo and Brexit by Sophia Besch 3 May 2018
The debate between the UK and the EU over British participation in the EU’s space programme ‘Galileo’ shows how difficult it will be to disentangle economic and security interests during Brexit negotiations. The UK and EU will struggle to negotiate a security partnership, despite both sides wanting one. They have encountered their first real disagreement, Britain’s participation in the EU’s space programme Galileo. The EU does not want to rely on British industry for technology used in Galileo. The UK is threatening to retaliate by stopping tech transfers to the Union altogether, and building a competing satellite programme. The debate over Galileo demonstrates the problems that underlie defence negotiations: it is difficult to disentangle economic and security interests, and the EU is reluctant to grant concessions to a close strategic ally like Britain beyond those it offers other third countries outside the EU, even if it is in its own security interest to do so. The fight has already corroded goodwill on both sides – even though negotiations over security have not officially begun. Galileo is Europe’s own global navigation satellite system, conceived as a competitor to the United States’ GPS, Russia’s GLONASS and China’s Beidou. The system is planned to be up and running by 2020. While Galileo’s basic positioning services will be open to all, the EU is also developing the ‘Public Regulated Service’ (PRS), an encrypted capability that is reserved for EU member states’ militaries and governments. PRS will use a range of different radio frequencies to broadcast encrypted signals, ensuring that the navigation service remains functional even if an adversary jams all other Galileo transmissions. Britain has been closely involved in the development of the Galileo programme. The British space industry has a turnover of around £14 billion per annum and employs close to 40,000 people. Currently, around 50 per cent of UK space industry exports go to Europe. The UK wants to increase its industry share up to 10 per cent of the global space market by 2030. In current projections, participation in Galileo (and other EU space programmes, like earth observation programme Copernicus) is essential to that goal. According to industry representatives, since the start of Galileo in 2003 the UK has funded about 12 per cent of its annual budget, and received contracts worth about 15 per cent. Surrey Satellite Technology, a CER INSIGHT: A hitchhiker’s guide to Galileo AND BREXIT 3 May 2018
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