Space Industry Bill [Lords] — House of Commons, 2018-01-15
Topic: Technology
Stephen Charles Kerr (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank the hon. Lady for her intervention, and I agree. It is important to establish a framework in which policy is laid out so that, as mentioned in her excellent speech, investors can have some view of the future and there can be certainty for investment decisions. Going back to what I was saying about the other Bills, it is important that legislation keeps up with the rate of change, and technological change in particular Several Members have mentioned the vital importance of spaceports and their location and the opportunity for this country to have satellite launch facilities within its borders instead of sending satellites abroad, and that issue has been well discussed throughout the debate. It is frequently pointed that the United Kingdom has some attractive geographic advantages when it comes to launch facilities. If someone is intent on launching satellites into polar orbit, launching them over an ocean at a good angle is what they are looking for, and Scotland has a good number of ideal locations for vertically launching satellites into polar orbit A space race is going on, but it is not the same as the space race of the past; this race is about establishing new spaceports. The competition is not just between locations in the United Kingdom—I totally subscribe to the view that there should be as many spaceports as demand requires—but between the United Kingdom and other northern European countries. This Bill allows the possibility of the UK getting into this game early, getting head and staying ahead Madam Deputy Speaker, you will not be surprised to hear me say that Scotland is indeed the ideal location for spaceports, and its candidate locations are competing to become Britain’s first spaceport. In a really good speech, my hon. Friend the Member for Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock (Bill Grant) spelled out the advantages of Prestwick, as did the hon. Member for Central Ayrshire (Dr Whitford), and one of the attractive features of the Prestwick proposal, apart from the geographic and meteorological advantages, is the community and cross-party unity on the matter. I cannot think of a more inspirational happening for the young people of the west of Scotland than the announcement of the building of a spaceport in Ayrshire—right on the doorstep of the vast majority of Scotland’s population I belong to the generation where the word space immediately conjures up the three-word phrase "the final frontier", which has been referred to several times, but we are talking about something far more real than the science fiction and television series of my boyhood. As an eight-year-old boy in 1969, I remember watching in wonder at the flickering black and white images on our family television as the astronauts of Apollo 11, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin—names that will live forever in the history of mankind—stepped out of the lunar module and on to the lunar surface, famously taking that "one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind." It was an exciting time and the possibilities of space exploration seemed limitless, and every young mind in the country was seized with the excitement of that possibility Sadly, before I had even reached my first year at secondary school, manned flight to the moon, which was such an exciting prospect, had lost the attention of the vast majority of people. It is sad to say that the only time in recent memory that the British public really embraced, in a popular way, the concept of space exploration was Christmas day 2003, when Colin Pillinger and his team attempted to land Beagle 2 on the surface of Mars, as I am sure we all remember. Perhaps in the best traditions of noble first endeavours, it did not quite come off. Colin sadly passed away without knowing that he had come very near to achieving the objective of the mission I am most excited about this Bill, this subject matter and what it does to fire the imaginations of our young people.