During a debate on the future of space policy at the Competitiveness Council on Friday 1 December, the Commissioner for the Internal Market and Industry, Elżbieta Bieńkowska, called for a dual vision of space policy as part of the next multiannual financial framework, containing both civil and defence and security sections.
During her introduction to the debate, the Commissioner said, “Space is a driver for defence and security and is expected to break what is still considered a ‘taboo’. We have to recognise the obvious synergies between space, security and defence in our programmes”. The Commissioner said that it is necessary to guarantee continuity and sustainability in the two European programmes in the space domain, namely, Galileo and Copernicus and to agreed to extending the two programmes’ scope of activity, also within the space domain.
Ireland opposes defence and security section. Many delegations appeared to support this dual approach and several member states highlighted the importance of Copernicus in the management of migration flows and in the control of external borders, as well as GovSatCom, which represents the next generation of government satellite communications for ensuring secure communications for the civil and military environment. Ireland, on the other hand, opposed this measure and indicated that it was against a defence chapter in European space policy.
Support for extending tasks of all European programmes, except from Germany. Many member states supported the idea of extending the application of these two programmes, particularly Copernicus, in an effort to respond to the objectives set out in the UN agreement on the climate in Paris (COP21). On several occasions Germany highlighted the need to respect budget restraints. It said that it was against extending the tasks of the Space Surveillance and Tracking (SST) programme.
‘New Space’. The expansion of the private sector was debated at length and the majority of delegations, including the Commissioner, highlighted the need to stimulate the private sector in Europe and strengthen public-private partnerships. In this regard, the European Commissioner pointed out that the signing of a dual pilot project last week could prefigure in this kind of partnership in the future (see EUROPE 11911).
The majority of delegations also highlighted the importance of increasing visibility for European space policy, particularly with regard to non-specialist communities in the space domain. They highlighted the importance of anchoring future policy at a local and regional level and including all actors. They all welcomed the approach for making open source space data produced by Copernicus available.
Conclusions on Copernicus and future of programme. On the same day, the Council adopted its conclusions on the midterm review of the Copernicus programme. According to the Commissioner, this is a particularly positive assessment. She pointed out that the results went well beyond expectations. EUROPE outlined the content of these conclusions in a previous newsletter (see EUROPE 11913).
The Bulgarian Presidency outlined its programme for space policy by highlighting the question of space dates and coordination of European programmes. A Space Council will take place on 13 March next. (Original version in French by Pascal Hansens)