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European Global Navigation Satellite System

I am always a little sceptical about figures produced by the European Commission on the success of its policies, given that Europe has been far more effective at producing public sector jobs than private sector jobs over the past 10 or 15 years. But if I may just pick up the challenge laid down by my hon. Friend, the key question is where the private sector revenues will come from. If there was any prospect of a secure revenue stream for the project, the private sector would be willing to invest in order to harness that revenue stream. Not only does that revenue stream not exist, there is no prospect of it coming into existence. The idea that this could be a privately funded project, resting on private capital, charging a privately generated revenue stream to get the satellites into orbit, has now been exposed. The project has been in the public domain for 10 years. The European Commission has been promulgating the idea that somehow the money will appear as a result of the satellites’ commercial potential for 10 years. The money will not appear. The revenue stream is not there. There comes a point when the Government must ante-up to their own position, which is that they should oppose the system in principle. It is a waste of money. It will not fly. It is a dud system.