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Britain ramped up a Brexit space row with the EU on Thursday, saying it will demand repayment if it is excluded from the Galileo satellite navigation project. Newspaper reports suggested London could seek £1 billion ($1.34 billion, 1.14 billion euros) in compensation for its investment in the programme.
Brussels has said it will deny London access to Galileo's encrypted signals after Brexit, citing legal issues about sharing sensitive security information with a non-member state.
A report issued by Britain's Department for Exiting the European Union said it had "strong objections" to being frozen out of the 10-billion-euro programme and called for an "urgent resolution to the exclusion". "Should the UK's future access be restricted, the UK's past contribution to the financing of space assets should be discussed," the report said. The British report suggested it may have to reopen negotiations on the £39 billion (40-45 billion euros) Brexit "divorce bill" that was agreed in December to make up for its exclusion. It said the deal agreed then had provided for Britain's continued involvement in the Galileo programme, which has important uses in both the civilian and military fields.
[...] Britain played a major role in developing Galileo, an alternative to the US's GPS, which is expected to be fully operational in 2026. It demands continued British access to the secure signal and a right to compete for contracts. Britain is looking into developing its own, separate system if the EU maintains its position, and has also raised the question of Galileo's use of Britain's overseas territories as monitoring bases.
[...] The Times newspaper reported Thursday that the decision to block Britain was being led by a "German-backed clique" in the European Commission, and that it had caused a rift with French officials, who were reportedly unhappy with the plan. Spain, Sweden, the Netherlands and the Baltic states have also objected to denying Britain access, said the report.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by khallow on Saturday May 26 2018, @04:48AM (10 children)
They didn't walk out of the ESA which is a separate organization from the EU. The EU already shared Galileo technology with non-EU members like Switzerland [galileognss.eu], Ukraine [upi.com], and Israel [timesofisrael.com]. Only one of those countries is even a member of the ESA.
I doubt any of those countries contributed as much as the UK did.
I don't know and don't care who really is at fault here. But the narrative that the EU has to completely cut off the UK from a lot of stuff (including a number of things that they don't cut off other non-EU countries from) because of Brexit is just a rather transparent rationalization for bullying. Sure, that bullying just might work either to keep the UK in the EU or to keep other countries from leaving, but it's a dubious, hypocritical thing to come out of a union which was supposed to be voluntary.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 26 2018, @06:36AM (2 children)
> I don't know and don't care who really is at fault here. But the narrative that the EU has to completely cut off the UK from a lot of stuff (including a number of things that they don't cut off other non-EU countries from) because of Brexit is just a rather transparent rationalization for bullying.
Exactly. The Brexiteers claim the EU is bullying the UK by excludng the UK from the core Galileo functons only available to EU members. The UK is getting demoted to an associate member, like Israel, Canada and other non-EU members involved in galileo. That the UK is being treated as a non-EU country seems to be a complete surprise to brexiteers.
They have sugested using Intelectual Property legislaton to stop the EU using UK IP used in galileo, convenitenly forgetting that the court to rule on IP differences between countries has been rejected as infringng on UK sovereignty by the same brexiteers.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday May 26 2018, @11:37AM
Is that what is going on? Looks to me like the Brexiteers are claiming something different [ft.com]:
That would be along the lines of my first post on this.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday May 26 2018, @11:41AM
Is that what is going on? Looks to me like the Brexiteers are claiming something different [ft.com]:
That would be along the lines of my first post on this.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Saturday May 26 2018, @09:10AM (5 children)
(Explanation for the observers of this sub-thread - the Galileo logo's almost entirely a tilted version of the EU logo.)
[* only in the way that Romneycare's an Obama thing, the pre-EU EC first proposed it, but it didn't fly.]
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday May 26 2018, @11:38AM (4 children)
Again, it's an ESA project with support by a number of non-EU countries. So no, I'm not buying it.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Sunday May 27 2018, @10:59AM (3 children)
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday May 28 2018, @12:09AM (2 children)
Because I "kinda know" that is irrelevant. If the EU wanted it to be an EU-only effort, then they shouldn't have done it through the ESA or be so inclusive with non-EU (and even non-ESA) members.
Like a lot of political conflict games, the EU could have chosen ways that didn't hurt the UK and were low public profile. But that might not discourage other countries from leaving the EU. Here, the UK has proven itself to be a trustworthy ally that funded a fair portion of the development of the Galileo system. They don't deserve to be treated like crap just because of a political conflict.
But they are. This illustrates the nasty side of the EU, namely, that it's a roach motel (that is, the lethal trap for roaches that baits and kills them) that one can readily enter, but is very hard to leave.
br. And let us keep in mind that overall this whole conflict happened because of the EU's rather dumb, promiscuous stance towards immigration (particularly from outside the EU) that ignored the wishes of a large portion of the EU population. Where is the democracy in that?
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Monday May 28 2018, @11:34AM (1 child)
They didn't, so they didn't. None of which changes the fact that the EU acted as the EU, and the UK's involvement was as part of the EU. If they EU change that, then they need to renegotiate their position.
Your clue-resistance is approaching legendary levels.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday May 28 2018, @01:24PM
Well, you happen to be wrong here. So what's the point of your posting?
Irrelevant since the ESA was the agency actually doing Galileo.
(Score: 2) by crafoo on Saturday May 26 2018, @11:42AM
I really hope that the UK can start working to reverse some of the damage that the EU did to their country. A full house cleaning is certainly in order.