Unidentified Flying Objects

Lord Holmes of Richmond Excerpts

Wednesday 30th June 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Goldie (Con)]

I simply say to the noble Lord that I seek to reassure him that, as I have indicated, we deal with actual threats substantiated by evidence. He is quite right about the closure of the UFO desk in 2009. I can confirm that the department holds no reports on unidentified aerial phenomena and that all relevant material created and held by the UFO desk has been passed to the National Archives.

[Lord Holmes of Richmond (Con)]

My Lords, turning to identifiable flying objects, does my noble friend agree that the UK has a tremendous opportunity to develop its new space industry, not least in low-earth orbit, in the build, development, launch, operation, recovery and rebuild of small satellites for both positive-purpose defence and civil opportunities?

[Baroness Goldie (Con)]

My noble friend makes an important point with which I entirely agree. That is clearly an area of exciting future development for the UK Government.