Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, whether the Government has (a) made contingency plans and (b) undertaken any cross-government exercises to respond to a scenario where there is a significant deterioration in or complete loss of all satellite capability and the operational use of space.

The UK Space Agency, as an executive Agency of BEIS, is the lead department assessing and mitigating space-based risks to Critical National Infrastructure (CNI). There are heavy dependencies between the CNI sectors such as defence operations, communications, aviation and shipping, which we are engaged in identifying, as well as working to ensure the impact of disruptions to space services is understood and mitigated.

The UK Space Agency is developing a comprehensive response framework that includes processes to follow for a range of incidents, including those that may cause deterioration in or complete loss of all satellite capability. We are continuing to mature our risk-specific plans.

In 2020 we ran our first UKSA-led cross-government discussion exercise which focussed on the risk of conjunctions and explored impacts such as significant loss of satellite capability. We are continuing to develop our exercising package and hope to exercise a wider range of scenarios, including a potential scenario that explores complete loss of all satellite capability, in due course.