Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the case for the UK to maintain full sovereign control of the Skynet satellite constellation into the future.

SKYNET 6 is the UK MOD’s strategic highly assured and protected satellite communications (SATCOM) capability. The criticality of maintaining Freedom of Action and Operational Independence, and therefore ‘sovereign control’ of this national capability, has been a firm requirement and has been verified every year since programme inception. To meet all known threats and to provide assured positive Command and Control of UK Armed Forces and support to other Government departments necessitates an appropriate level of UK ‘ownership’, as defined in the Defence Space Strategy and the MOD’s Assured Capability framework. This is delivered by balancing UK-led activities with the use of allied networks and the global commercial market, where appropriate.