Space Sector: Government Support

Chris Bryant Excerpts

Wednesday 4th September 2024 Westminster Hall

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered Government support for the space sector.

It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Mr Dowd. I welcome the Minister to his place and to his new role, and I wish him every success in it. When we talk about the UK space sector, it is worth reflecting that, when the Minister and I first arrived here as fresh-faced and enthusiastic newbies in 2001—

[The Minister for Data Protection and Telecoms (Chris Bryant)]

You might have been!

[Mr Carmichael]

I don’t think I ever was, actually.

Back in 2001, there was no such thing; the sector has emerged at a quite remarkable pace and has its roots in the early days of the coalition Government. Competitions were set up looking for opportunities to develop infrastructure in a UK space sector. That has led to a UK-wide space strategy, with interests in the north of Scotland, Cornwall, the Western Isles and other parts of the country. It is worth reflecting that the legacy of that competitive start-up has been a sense of competition between the different players in the sector. Now, as we approach maturity—we are perhaps months from the first vertical launch in the United Kingdom—a different picture is emerging. The success of any one of the different parts of the UK space industry can be only good for all parts.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister for Creative Industries, Arts and Tourism (Chris Bryant)]

It is a great delight to see you in your seat, Mr Dowd, not least because, as I have commented before, you are one of the snappiest dressers in Parliament and London fashion week is fast approaching. That is not part of my space portfolio, but it is part of my culture portfolio. I very much hope we will see you on the catwalk.

What goes around comes around. It is a funny old world, isn’t it? I think the last debate I addressed in Westminster Hall from this side of the Chamber was also led by the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael). It was about the global abolition of the death penalty. We completely agreed with one another on 28 October 2009 and, funnily enough, we completely agree with one another today.

I am slightly nervous about the right hon. Member saying that we should sing from the same hymn sheet, only because I am an Anglican—not a particularly good one—and I have a particular loathing of paraphrases sung to dirges, so I am not sure we can sing exactly from the same hymn sheet, but he makes an extremely good point. The Government are very keen to work with the Scottish Government, with local authorities and obviously the commercial players in the field to make sure that we gain all the possible benefits from space to the UK economy and to the way we run our society, our business and our Government.

It is a particular delight also to see the hon. Member for Wyre Forest (Mark Garnier), because I know he has been interested in the subject and led the last debate on it in Westminster Hall. I know that a series of Members are interested in the matter, and I hope to ensure that by the end of this Parliament even more Members are cognisant of the issues and able to drive the agenda forward with the Government. There are many things that we need to change in this country, but we are absolutely committed—as committed as the previous Government—to ensuring that we harness and garner the benefits and opportunities of space.

I do not think of space as the final frontier; I think of it as the biggest opportunity in my portfolio when it comes to economic growth and our economic advantage in relation to other countries. There are other aspects, some of which the right hon. Member referred to, and I will of course come on to the specifics of Shetland—though my family is rather more Stornoway.

[Jamie Stone (Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross) (LD)]

There is of course room for more than one space launch site in the UK, and we wish SaxaVord well in its future endeavours. The Minister has talked about the economic benefits to the country, but for Sutherland a space launch represents a social benefit to young people and jobs for the future in a fragile and remote part of the UK. My request is simply this: Ministers have a good relationship with the company Orbex, referred to by the hon. Member for Moray West, Nairn and Strathspey (Graham Leadbitter), and I would be grateful if that relationship could be built on.

[Chris Bryant]

I have every intention of building on all these relationships as fast as I possibly can. There are others—indeed, I am going to see Airbus in the next couple of weeks. Hundreds of companies in the UK are engaged in the various aspects of the value chain that lead to sending something up into space, keeping something up in space or taking something down from space, or that use the data that comes from space, or that provide the software, the mission control or whatever. There is a wide range of companies, and I want to engage with as many of them as fast as I can. Obviously, the two that we have referred to are already high on that list, and I would like to make a visit to Shetland soon if possible.

I know Grantown-on-Spey very well because I spent a lot of my childhood in Aviemore. I had a very constructive conversation with Mr Strang last week, and we are keen to work with his organisation. I suspect I will be visiting Grantown, as well as Shetland, in the not-too-distant future. Incidentally, there are some issues in relation to telecoms on mountains in Scotland that I would also like to address.

As has been said, space is a strategic priority for this Government, as it was for the previous one. It is also a competitive advantage for the UK. The point has been made about vertical take-off; we have more than half the capacity across Europe. The right hon. Member referred to Norway as a neighbour. It does not feel so much like a neighbour in the south Wales valleys, but I understand his point. None the less, because of our geography, our time zones and so on, the UK has a unique opportunity to steal a march on the rest of Europe, and we are determined do so if we possibly can.

The right hon. Member also made a point about skills and young people coming into the industry. We have spent quite a lot of time and DSIT money trying to ensure that we have the skills in the UK. We are well served, and we need to ensure that there is an ongoing build-up of people available to work in the industry, that they are able to get the training and support they need, and that people from a variety of backgrounds can conceive of a future career in those industries, even if it is not necessarily on their doorstep. We intend to work on that.

Of course, this is a commercial domain in large measure, but it is not necessarily a cheap or easy one. As has been said, space is hard; long-term investment is obviously far more important than short-term gain. We want to ensure that all commercial operators working in the field have an opportunity to seize investment opportunities, and we are aware that there will have to be Government involvement in that process.

[Mark Garnier (Wyre Forest) (Con)]

Will the Minister give way?

[Chris Bryant]

I thought I might have stimulated the hon. Member.

[Mark Garnier]

Before I start, I refer hon. Members to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. Everything the Minister has said so far is music to my ears. I hope to carry on as chair of the all-party parliamentary group for space, as I was in the last Parliament. One criticism that the all-party group had of the Government then was although the space strategy was a very good manifesto, it did not stack up to being a strategy. Everything the Minister has talked about in relation to the commercialisation of space is really important, but the strategy needs detail. He will not be able to answer this question immediately, but could he consider, as he gets more involved in his portfolio, looking into more details on the strategy in order to make it more than just a manifesto, so that businesses can really get their teeth into the industry?

[Chris Bryant]

That is a very fair point. All the new Ministers arriving in DSIT have been very keen to provide as much strategic clarity as possible about our direction of travel. Perhaps one could say that the advantage of having a decent majority in Parliament is that one can lay out a strategy for a period of time, rather than just running to catch up with one’s tail. Likewise, I take the point made by the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland that it is that clarity of strategic objectives that shows, “Yes, this is what we are doing; that is not our priority.” That makes it much easier for inward investment into the UK to make secure investments for the long term.

Some of the things that my right hon. Friend the Chancellor has said about business taxation are important as well. The aim is to create an environment in which people can invest securely, knowing where they are going, that the Government will have their back and that the strategy will not change every six months. I note the points made by the National Audit Office. I think the previous Government were very much trying to point in this direction, but perhaps they did not quite land it; maybe there was an anomaly at some point in the process of developing the long-term strategy.

Some hon. Members might not initially think of space as significant to the daily lives of their constituents, but I think it is worth pointing out something that is part of our lives: sat-nav. We all used to have rows in the car, trying to work out where we were going. Sat-nav now does the work for us—although I note that none of the sat-nav operators seems to understand how to say the name of my street in Wales or, frankly, any of the roads or towns in Wales—but this is not just about sat-nav for personal life; it is also about Earth observation, which makes it much easier to predict weather patterns. I had an interesting conversation the other day with a wine operator from the south-east, who was saying that that is really important for them to work out when they should harvest to ensure that there is the right amount of sugar in the grapes and so on. Similarly, data coming from satellites will enable the Government and many operators to provide services more effectively, efficiently and cheaply, and in a way that is more intuitive for ordinary consumers.

In all those fields, space is a really important part of how Government do their business, and how we better facilitate a strong economy and better society. Of course, it is not just the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology that has a very significant interest in space. I pay tribute to the Ministry of Defence, which has been a major player in the field; obviously, it is a NATO operational domain, apart from anything else. The MOD is investing £6.5 billion over a decade, including £5 billion for satellite communications through Skynet and £1.5 billion through the defence space portfolio. Many other Departments—the Department for Business and Trade, the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, the Department for Transport, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and so on—are also engaged in this work.

Skills were mentioned earlier. The UK Space Agency has been funding £19.6 million since 2022 in this skills field, because if people want to invest, they are going to do so on the basis that we have a skilled workforce in the UK that is available not just today but in five, 10, 15 and 20 years’ time.

I will say a few things about the launch sector, which is obviously of primary interest to the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland. Roughly 200 companies are engaged in the launch sector in the UK. As I said, some are involved in rockets; we have also referred to subsystems, spaceports, mission control, apps and all the technology that goes into making all of this possible. Roughly 1,500 people in the UK are involved, and they are fairly well paid, so that is a significant part of our economy with significant opportunity for growth. It brought in something like £336 million last year and had a GVA of £153 million. Over the past six years, the Government have invested something like £91 million in our launch capabilities—the right hon. Gentleman referred to the £10 million loan to SaxaVord.

We are ongoing in our commitment, and that commitment has not been shaken by any anomalies that might have been seen on launch. I did feel a bit worried that my first engagement with space was something going not entirely to plan, but I do not think that there is a causal relationship between that and my arriving in post.

In relation to Shetland, the right hon. Gentleman is absolutely right that we need to work with the devolved Administration. I am very keen to have conversations with our colleagues in Scotland, my counterparts in Scotland, and of course with the Scotland Office. We need to work as a united Government to achieve what we want in the field.

As I say, I have spoken to Frank Strang and I am very keen, at the earliest opportunity, to visit both Grantown-on-Spey and Shetland. I cannot say when the next attempted launch may be, but Members are absolutely right: it is not a failure to have an event that does not go entirely to plan, when all of the contingency plans do click in correctly and properly so that there is no harm or danger to life. We see it as a blip, not as a final problem, and it does not undermine our long-term commitment.

There are a couple of points to be made about value for money, which goes to the point about clarity of strategy. We are going to have a very tough spending review—I think everybody might have sussed that by now; the messaging has been strong enough on the subject—and that will undoubtedly be true in this field too. We need to be absolutely clear about what we are seeking to achieve, and about what the whole consortium of businesses and players in the space field want to achieve, so that we get really good value for money for the UK economy. It would be a terrible dereliction of a significant economic and strategic opportunity for the UK if we were somehow or other to abandon this field or diminish our commitment.

I hope that I have reassured the right hon. Member—just as I reassured him on 28 October 2009, when we were both in favour of the abolition of the death penalty everywhere in the world—that the UK Government are not stinting in our commitment to space and to the strategic and economic opportunities that it affords us.

[Peter Dowd (in the Chair)]

Thank you. On the subject of space, Minister, can I say that your tie is stellar?

Question put and agreed to.