Space Industry Bill [HL]

Lord Tunnicliffe Excerpts

Report stage (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 14th November 2017 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Tunnicliffe]

4: Clause 9, page 7, line 37, leave out “to (4)” and insert “and (3)”

[Lord Tunnicliffe (Lab)]

My Lords, I shall speak also to the other amendments in this group.

I have read my speech in Committee, which was very good and persuasive. The trouble is that it was also unsuccessful and so, as a student of the Companion, I will not repeat it. However, I would like to say a final word or two on safety. I thank the Minister for the time she and her predecessor spent with us discussing this matter and for the letter she sent us on two points, to which I will come later.

NASA has been in the space business since I was a boy—and that was a long time ago. I have had a brief look at its website and, as far as I can see, it spends £2.9 billion a year on safety and security. However, despite its efforts, it has regularly killed people. The early rocket-powered flight experiments had fatalities; it is often forgotten that the moon programme killed three astronauts on the ground when there was a fire in the capsule; the shuttle programme managed only 135 missions, two crashed catastrophically and 14 people died. That was probably as well as could be done with all that effort, but we are asking the CAA and/or the United Kingdom Space Agency to tackle the same task. I am afraid that I am somewhat pessimistic about what the result will be in the early stages of any UK space programme. I hope in developing the skills they will need that they will spend a lot of time with our American cousins, in particular, stealing as much knowledge as is possible.

As I said earlier, I thank the Minister for the time she found for us. She was kind enough to send us a letter giving assurances about the role of the HSE and single point accountability with respect to safety. I will not repeat the letter because I am assured she is happy to read those assurances into her response. With that, I beg to move.

[Lord Fox (LD)]

My Lords, names of Members from our Benches are not attached to these amendments, but we would like to associate ourselves with all four of them. I want to say a few words about safety because it is obviously not in the industry’s interest to operate unsafely; in fact, quite the opposite. It would be a way of hastening its end. So it is not that the industry will set out to operate in a cavalier manner, and that is not what these amendments imply. From my experience of working in industries that have an inherent risk but are not necessarily as risky as the space industry, the greater prominence that safety is given in their operations at every level right up to senior management and in terms of the supervision of organisations, the more likely it is that they will be inherently safe. You can rely on processes and people on the ground to operate safely because of course it is in their interests to do so, but it is always more successful when safety is elevated to the highest possible level. It is with that in mind that we support these amendments.

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[Lord Tunnicliffe]

My Lords, I too have spent most of my career in safety-critical environments. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Fox, for his support. It is not directly related to the Bill, but I will take this opportunity to agree with his statements about the essence of a good safety organisation. It is crucial that safety goes from the top to the bottom and that the chief executives and the board, right down to every worker, know that safety is part of their responsibility. I hope that attitude will go through this new industry, especially as we move into the manned spaceflight phase.

I thank the Minister for her assurances. It is important that we have clear, single point accountability among regulators. If it is in the public domain, I would value a copy of the memorandum between the HSE and the appropriate regulators. With those few comments, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 4 withdrawn.

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[Baroness Randerson]

My Lords, the amendment relates to the position of the CAA. We tabled a similar amendment in Committee. As promised, I went away and read Hansard carefully, because at the end of the debate I was still not clear about resources. The then Minister addressed a charging regime for assessing and issuing licences for monitoring and so on. Clause 61 gives the CAA and the space agency the powers to charge for their services. We can safely assume that they will charge the commercial rate to cover their costs, but my reservations were also about the development and expansion of the CAA to take on its new role prior to it becoming commercially viable. That aspect was not addressed in the Government’s response in Committee.

I was very pleased to receive a letter from the chief executive of the CAA setting out its viewpoint. As well as referring to the CAA’s power to set charges, it addresses the preparation issue. It says:

“Until the Space Flight legislation is in force the DfT is funding the CAA team that has been established to focus solely on supporting the Government with the development of the Bill and the regulatory framework, so the CAA will be ready to regulate this UK industry once the statutory powers are in place”.


I am very grateful for that additional information and I am glad to hear that the Department for Transport is funding that team, but I press the Minister for a little more detail. I find it quite difficult to get a handle on how big this team is. Perhaps she could quantify the funding that is in place to assist the CAA. Can she provide some detail on training? In working towards such a regulation, the CAA would undoubtedly look at parallels; for example, the regulation of normal aviation. However, it is surely looking across the world at how other countries regulate the space industry. I assume that there is an element of seeking information from other countries across the world, if not of sending employees to train there. I would be grateful for a bit more information to flesh out the assurances that I received from the CAA. I beg to move.

[Lord Tunnicliffe]

My Lords, I support the general spirit and direction of the amendment. The task that the CAA and the space agency will face will be very difficult. I hope that the Government will be able to give us further assurances that resources will be made available to power this learning curve. I hope that there will be enough time for the skills to be in place before real applications come before the regulator. It is easy to underestimate just how difficult this task will be for the CAA and the space agency.

[Lord Fox]

The nature of this work, certainly in the early stages, could be quite lumpy. In earlier discussions —at Second Reading, I think—the Minister talked about perhaps only 12 launches a year. There could be moments of great intensity of activity followed by no activity and therefore no income. How will the regulator maintain this level of expertise through what could be feast and famine during that process?

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Moved by

[Lord Tunnicliffe]

15: Clause 34, page 25, line 3, leave out “may” and insert “must”

[Lord Tunnicliffe (Lab)]

My Lords, I rise to move Amendment 15. We put forward a series of probing amendments in Committee. The noble Lord, Lord Callanan, gave a long and detailed response to those, which I thank him for, which helped us understand how the various clauses relating to this whole issue work together. Unfortunately, there is just one point left. It is not at all complicated, and therefore I will not make a long speech about it, but this amendment addresses that single point.

Where the damage to an uninvolved third party exceeds the cap, and the insurance, the state must meet the excess. We are talking about a new phenomenon—flying bombs of one sort or another. The potential for catastrophic damage is there. It may not be very likely, but it could happen. It is potentially significantly more dangerous than the worst conceivable civil aviation accident at present, and it cannot be right that an uninvolved third party who suffers loss does not receive full compensation.

The Government have argued effectively to the House that the industry may need a cap and that it may not get off the ground without an appropriate arrangement. We agree, but if Her Majesty’s Government limit the operator’s liability, they must commit to making up the difference, and put that commitment in the Bill. I beg to move.

[Lord McNally]

My Lords, listening to what the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, said, and the earlier debate about safety, one thing that occurred to me was seeing the newsreel footage of the crash of the “Hindenburg”, just before the Second World War—a crash that virtually ended the airship as a commercial prospect. That is a useful reminder that what may be seen as the next new thing could be disastrously impacted.

The simple message, which seems so obvious, is that if entrepreneurs considering coming into the industry have unlimited liability, they will not come in. If there is no cover—particularly, as the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, emphasised, for third parties—that would be totally unacceptable. The problem has been spelled out; the Government should face up to those contradictions.

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[Lord Tunnicliffe]

My Lords, I think that is a win. I see the noble Baroness nodding, and I take it that the Government will be tabling an amendment in the other place. On that understanding, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 15 withdrawn.

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[Lord Fox]

My Lords, I am afraid that this is Groundhog Day all over again. We have discussed these issues and I will not go into the economics, save to say that there is huge potential for very high insurance costs for multi-satellite constellation launches. In Committee, the Minister said that work was in hand and would be finalised within 12 months of the Bill receiving Royal Assent, so the amendment was not necessary. I feel that it is necessary because this is the make or break economically of the nano-constellation-style satellite. Without resolution of this issue, there will be no industry in this regard because it will be too expensive to launch these satellites in this country. For that reason, while the work is in hand—and I accept in good faith that it will be completed—we believe that the amendment should be agreed. I beg to move.

[Lord Tunnicliffe]

My Lords, we support the general thrust of this proposal and hope that the Minister will say sufficiently warm words so that the amendment will not be pressed. I hope that she will be driven by the simple fact that the industry almost certainly will not get off the ground unless the Government can produce some assurance that appropriate legislation will be brought forward at some stage to enable small satellites to be economically effective.

[Lord Deben (Con)]

I look forward to my noble friend’s reply and take this opportunity to say how exemplary the Government’s response has been on a range of issues that we have raised. If they responded in this way on a lot of other issues it would be very much easier for all of us. My noble friend has indicated in her delightful and charming way that she thought these amendments were worth while. Can we extend such a response more widely so that we do not have to have acrimonious discussions and then find ourselves with an amendment which is more or less similar to what has been proposed before? This is a very good example of that. People should always say thank you, and I do so.

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[Lord Deben]

I am sure the House will accept that the Minister wishes to be less precise than the noble Baroness would like her to be, although her spirit suggests that she might move a little towards what is proposed here.

I wish to say two things. I welcome these amendments. They show the care that we all have to take at the extension of ministerial power. Even the small difference between expediency and appropriateness is a big gulf when it comes to attitudes. Expediency is a subjective statement whereas appropriateness can properly be tested in an objective way. I welcome the changes that have taken place.

In the course of the debate it was suggested that other legislation was the same as this. I have looked at the other legislation—I am boring like that—and, having been a Minister, I know that people occasionally put before one a phrase which is perhaps ill advised. The other legislation is not the same—it is rather different. One of the things your Lordships’ House is here to do is to deal with tiny differences which, when they get on to the statute book, become serious. As I take more and more time to deal with questions of climate change and the like, I find that there are institutional barriers to things that are obviously sensible to do because, at some time at some place, no one looked at the wording properly to ensure it did not create circumstances which made decisions more difficult.

As I said earlier, my thanks for the amendments will be accompanied by a warning that it is important to use this House in the way in which it has properly been used on this Bill. My noble friend may feel that a little more in the direction of the devolved Governments would be helpful. Certainly I would like to know more about their willingness to support the legislation as it is. That is the centrepiece of this disagreement and, as we have so few disagreements now, it would be nice to get rid of this one.

[Lord Tunnicliffe (Lab)]

My Lords, I would like to reflect briefly on what the noble Lord, Lord Deben, has said about the processing of this Bill. We will have a remarkably short Report stage, having had a good deal longer in Committee, because the Minister—I would say at our insistence but it would be unfair to suggest there was any resistance—has been willing to provide a great deal of time in private to work through the Bill in detail. There have been many concessions, which have been moved today and will form part of the Bill. This is an example of what an Opposition do best. The government concessions on land use and so forth add up to as good a deal as we think we are going to get, and the sensible thing for a good Administration to do is to take it. If we go any further we will end up dividing the House. We might or might not win, it then becomes a hostile environment, and things may get worse as a result. Therefore part of the process, unglamorous as it is, is to bank what you can.

I do not want to underestimate this because the Government have gone a long way in their concessions, but I will not recite them. I am pleased that the Minister has brought out the power in Clause 43; if she had done so in Committee I might not have made such a vigorous attack. That is because with our limited resources—I cannot think of a better way of putting it—we did not quite get to Clause 43. Certainly the compensation that Clause 43 refers to in Schedule 8 rounds off the land issues, so they are now as well rounded as they reasonably can be.

I share the view about Amendment 21, which I hope will not be pressed, but it would be good if the Minister could say a little more about it. I hope that the issue of reference to the devolved Administrations, which in successive Bills over the next several months we will be facing, is made a bit clearer. We must look at how it goes into future legislation. With that, I thank the Minister and all who have been involved not so much in this debate but in the wider debates both within and outside the Chamber for coming to what is a pretty good and rounded deal on the land issue.