HC Deb 10 July 1970 vol 803 cc1102-14

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn—[Mr. Fortescue.]

4.0 p.m.

Mr. Tam Dalyell (West Lothian)

Esoteric or not, I should like to congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Islington, South-West (Mr. George Cunningham) and my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley (Dr. Gilbert) upon raising matters which anyone with experience of the last five years knows very well are at the heart of government, if not at the heart of politics. Normally one congratulates maiden speakers on their fluency. Certainly, they were fluent. I congratulate them on content and the choice of subject on which they chose to make their maiden speeches.

I must say to my hon. Friend the Member for Islington, South-West that I, too, and many others would like to see a breakdown of apartheid between civil servants.

Mr. Speaker

Order. The hon. Member may congratulate his hon. Friends, but he must come to the subject of his Adjournment debate.

Mr. Dalyell

Very well, Mr. Speaker. If the Minister of State, Treasury thinks that that subject was esoteric, mine must be even more esoteric still!

I would say in relation to the whole question of the N.A.S.A. proposals that 15 years ago people thought that the Treaty of Messina was somewhat esoteric. Perhaps it is a matter of regret to a number of hon. Members that we did not take more notice of the whole business of the Treaty of Messina in the mid-1950s. Therefore, I believe that although this is not in the same league as going into the Common Market, nevertheless, for Britain and British industry, extremely important consequences are involved in the N.A.S.A. proposal and in the proposals of Dr. Thomas Paine.

My object in raising this matter is partly that discussion should not go by default and partly because urgent decisions will have to be taken before the House of Commons reassembles in October. There have been many references to the General Election. Throughout the campaign in West Lothian, at almost every meeting I mentioned that I was interested in this proposal and that it would cost a great deal of money. It was a matter of considerable argument. I do not pretend that that is the only reason why the result in West Lothian reversed the national trend and why I had a higher percentage of the votes cast than at the previous election. I do, however, reflect that, put properly, this case has a great deal of interest for a large number of those in modern industry and that in so far as any of us have a mandate for any one policy, I certainly have a mandate of an increased majority of 5,500 votes from the people of West Lothian to raise the whole subject of what, I hope, will be eventually the acceptance of the offer of Dr. Thomas Paine.

If the United States' proposal were carried through, it would indeed change the whole picture of space policy and it would make many of the present projects seem rather irrelevant. That, I think, would be agreed ground. Also, possibly, on agreed ground is the whole question of air traffic control of the satellites and the possibility of a fifty-fifty share with N.A.S.A. in 1975. I hope that this will be negotiated at the Ministerial space conference at Brussels on 22nd to 24th July which, I gather, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Technology will be attending. I hope that particular attention will be paid to the effect of this satellite on the North Atlantic air routes, which are becoming almost as busy as Piccadilly Circus, and to the fact that if it is not essential for subsonic aircraft, it will certainly be essential for dealing with supersonic aircraft.

The next issue that I wish to raise is the communications satellite for the 1980s. I simply say in "shorthand" that I hope that consideration will be given to the second geostationary E.S.R.O. vehicle. These are the urgent, practical issues. Another less urgent, practical issue is the question of the advanced polar orbit meteorological satellite.

The crux of the matter, however, is the space station-cum-shuttle. The core of this manned system is that it appears to promise to cut the cost of putting into orbit every pound of payload by a factor of 10.

We come to the question of the reusable launcher and shuttle, and quite openly, to put the case as clearly as I can, I should like to borrow from Dr. Homer Newell's presentation at the Bonn Conference on 7th and 8th July. What he says is this: At the core of this programme of balanced goals are two new concepts. The first is a transportation system for carrying payloads to and from space which will be re-usable and hence reduce the cost of space programmes by an order of magnitude or more. The second new element is a permanent space station with facilities for a wide variety of uses, ultimately extending to industrial-type production operations. These two new tools—if I may use that term—are intimately related. The uses of the space station depend in good part on the availability of the economical logistic systems presented by the shuttle rocket planes. In a broader context, almost all operations near earth and to the planets will be shaped by the economics of the re-usable vehicles. The reusable rocket plane or shuttle will carry tons of payload to orbit and can remain there for days before returning to earth. Its crew can repair or re-supply previously placed payloads, or it can move them to another orbit or return them to earth for examination or repair and re-use. It will be the main logistic carrier for the space station. The space station we see as a place where men can live and work in orbit for indefinite periods. A progress report on the work under way to define its structure and use was given last month in Paris. The station construction would probably be modular, so that over the years we can add additional parts as we define new experiments and uses. It will grow during a decade to a very substantial research facility, and ultimately, we believe, to a unique facility for practical uses, including perhaps commercial manufacture. This and the rest of the presentation I am sure is known to the Department. So I will save time.

However, a great deal of the value of the space station depends on the amount of use, and therefore a decision whether Europe will or will not co-operate is of some importance, and I should like some comment, if it is not premature, on the European view, and particularly the German view, which seems to be very favourable.

I would also ask the Minister what serious study is going on of the space station and whether such study is to be put in serious process or not. The crucial question is, what advantage does a man have in space in relation to a machine? An Adjournment debate on a Friday is not the time or place to answer that question. All I want to know is that a serious analytical study is being made of what is being done.

I should like some comment also on the argument that it may be irrelevant to have a scientific automatic satellite of one-third the value and three times the relative cost of what could be achieved by a space station.

I would also ask whether the advantages of maintenance and repair are as great as they have been claimed particularly by Dr. Bondi. The question of the full maintenance factor is really crucial; related to this is the issue of the vibration argument, and whether it is as significant as made out.

On a rather different note, I would like the British Government to reflect whether, if we do not accept something like N.A.S.A.'s offer, it is likely that the Americans will be obliged then to treat us as European competitors. It seems to me that this sort of argument is not just a question of acceptance or refusal of a status quo situation if we do nothing about it. If we do nothing about it, then the situation, by doing nothing about it, is changed. In this context it would be important not to leave out the whole future use in this respect of the RB 211 engine booster in relation to space vehicles, as an air-breather engine.

I should like to know whether the Government dissent from the general cost estimate of between 200 million and 300 million dollars per annum on a European collective basis.

I should also, at a fairly early stage, but perhaps not this afternoon, like to know the Government's view on the international programme in relation to the national programme. My own view is that the national programme, by definition, will not tackle the problems which are contemporary as such.

Perhaps the worst of all possible worlds is the one in which we find ourselves doing things which are 15 years behind the United States. In some ways, although I would like to see Britain making a space effort, it would be better to cut the whole European effort dead rather than tag along behind what the Americans are already doing. It seems that the middle way may be the most unsatisfactory option of all. Both in the Sunday Times of 5th June and Flight of 21st May there are very open arguments as to how important this is for British industry.

It is clear that the British response will have a great effect on the whole western effort, because there are people in Congress who respect the critical faculties of a British Government and of British Government advisers who perhaps would be prepared to play a far larger part if they thought that the critical British would go along with the proposals. We are particularly respected by the internationalist wing in Congress, who are perhaps precisely those most critical of the American effort. We are also respected as a country where there is no obvious powerful space lobby.

I must say one word to some of my hon. Friends such as the hon. Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Michael Foot) who think it is nonsense for us to spend money on this sort of project when there are so many urgent things we could be doing at home in a terrestrial way. I reflect that competition for resources may not be between space and hospitals, it may rather be between space and military expenditure, as in America it is between space and Vietnam. I hope that we will consider all these questions very seriously, the question of internationalising man's epic adventure into space, an adventure that belongs not to one nation but to all mankind, and that we can work the international mechanisms for developing and managing the major multi-national space ventures. I am grateful to my right hon. Friend the Member for Bristol South-East (Mr. Benn) for having taken the trouble to come along.

4.12 p.m.

Mr. Anthony Wedgwood Benn (Bristol, South-East)

The Parliamentary Secretary has told me that he would like to take a full fifteen minutes to reply and therefore I will confine myself to raising one or two points.

First, I should like to thank my hon. Friend the Member for West Lothian (Mr. Dalyell) for raising this subject What he said about the N.A.S.A. offer is absolutely right. It is a major effort which the Americans are discussing but they have not yet decided. It has been discussed unilaterally between Dr. Paine and myself on a number of occasions and between Dr. Paine and other European countries. In the spring I organised a multilateral discussion with Mr. Ortoli and Dr. Klaus von Dohnanyi from Germany. He subsequently went with Chancellor Brandt to the United States and I had discussions with N.A.S.A. in Washington when I was there in April.

I should like to ask three questions. Can the hon. Gentleman confirm that we are intending that multilateral talks should go on in Europe so that we do not have this peripatetic American visitor, who has a lot to say to us, without talking among ourselves and with him?

Secondly, does the hon. Gentleman agree that when we meet among ourselves—I am talking about the British, Germans, French and the others—we do not get Governmental decisions before the Ministers' meeting? One of the great reasons for the failure of these discussions in the past was that Cabinets commit their representatives before they go and the result is that there is no flexibility in discussion. I was trying to organise—and I believe that it has some merit—a lunch club in effect, where European Ministers could talk as informally as they do in the House before going back to Governments.

Does the hon. Gentleman recognise that any long-term value of this is industrial? I hope that we can get away from the romantic view of technology which led us into some difficulties in the past. We should consult very fully with British industry. We should not rule out the possibility that the true interest for this country is the user interest in the new capability and we should not think that the hardware must always take preference over the application.

It is a big decision, committing money and above all skilled manpower. Without prejudice to what my hon. Friend said, it is a decision that ought not to be taken without as much information as possible being available. I hope that when we come to the crunch the Minister will be able to give us some details of his methodology, of the list of options, the alternative costs and, above all, the alternative skilled manpower requirements before a decision is taken. Having said that, I look forward to the hon. Gentleman's first speech from the Front Bench, speaking for a Department which I dearly loved and one which he will decorate and serve with great honour.

4.15 p.m.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Technology (Mr. David Price)

I am sure that the whole House is most grateful to the hon. Member for West Lothian (Mr. Dalyell) for raising the important matter of participation in the post-Apollo programme, a participation which I know he will agree is essentially a European matter.

I should like to thank the right hon. Member for Bristol, South-East (Mr. Benn) for his brief and most helpful intervention in this short debate. The hon. Member for West Lothian has raised a large number of issues and I doubt whether I shall have the time to cover them. I will stick to his main point which dealt with the post-Apollo programme.

Let me say straight away that I share the hon. Member's enthusiasm for space. I hope that he and the House will agree that my own European credentials on space matters are well known. He will remember that as a representative of this House at the Consultative Assembly of the Council of Europe I launched the Council into space in 1960. Re-reading my report of 10 years ago I find little that I should like to change except for the fact that the American and Russian manned space programmes progressed far more quickly than I then expected. However, on all the other potential space projects I stand broadly by my report.

I know that it is both the adventure and the industrial prospects of space that appeal to those of us in this House who are interested in this subject. I share the view of the hon. Gentleman in wishing that the interest in the House on this subject were wider than it is. The House will recall the well-known saying of that great Russian, K. E. Tsiolkovsky, Earth is the cradle of the mind, but one cannot live in the cradle for ever The unfortunate fact of life is that it is very expensive for a nation like Britain, or even for a Continent like Europe, to leave the cradle. The hon. Gentleman talked a little about what he thought was the wrong compromise on our own current expenditure. I have not time to go into it today, but I would commend to hon. Members the Sixth Report of the Select Committee on Science and Technology last Session which incorporated a memorandum from all Departments, which the right hon. Gentleman no doubt had a considerable part in writing and approving, and which gives the present deployment of our effort.

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration has had a major rethink about where it wishes to go after the fulfilment of the Apollo programme. N.A.S.A. plans a development programme of three inter-related elements. The first is the re-usable "shuttle" launcher to ferry payloads, including personnel without astronaut training, between earth and low-earth orbit. N.A.S.A. expects this to be in operation by about 1980, but the magnitude of the task may be illustrated by comparing it to mounting a supersonic transport on top of a Boeing 747, and pushing its speed up to Mach 10.

The second element is the manned space station permanently in low earth orbit in which personnel could work and live for a number of weeks, undertaking scientific and other tasks. The third element is the orbital transportation system—involving one or more types of vehicle to operate from the space station for various purposes, such as onward transport to the moon or deeper space, and so-called tugs for putting satellites in geo-stationary orbit, and retrieving, replacing and servicing them.

At this stage, no valid estimates of cost are possible. The President's Space Task Group put forward three alternative outlines of a post-Apollo programme—differing in timing rather than content—the cheapest of which envisaged a total cost of 5,000 million dollars per annum for the middle 1970's. Figures of 5,000–6,000 million dollars each have been mentioned for development of the space station and of the space shuttle; but, in the latter case particularly, the technical advances involved are so great that the eventual cost may prove to be considerably more.

I would like to spend a moment telling the House what seem to me to be implications of the N.A.S.A. proposals.

By exploiting the principles of reusability and commonality, N.A.S.A. hopes to reduce by a factor of ten the cost of putting payloads into orbit. While the achievement of such a reduction will require a high rate of utilisation of the system, it must be anticipated that it will also have the effect of enlarging the range of functions which might be worth undertaking in space. The proposals imply in addition a considerable revolution in the philosophy of satellite design, the transformation of the operation of launching and transporting payloads to orbit into a routine one, and completely new possibilities for scientific research in space.

An interesting and in many ways exciting aspect of N.A.S.A.s new thinking is that it is anxious to involve European countries in this post-Apollo programme.

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration, in the autumn of 1969 on behalf of the U.S. Government, invited Europe collectively, and the leading countries, including ourselves, individually, to participate in its post-Apollo programme. This will eventually, if it is carried through, involve a total transformation of space activities.

The U.S. approach was made primarily to the Member States of the European Space Conference as a whole. There has been preliminary discussion between these Member States, but no conclusions have been reached beyond that the proposals have far-reaching effect; that they must be taken very seriously; that, if possible, Europe should respond collectively, as indeed the Americans have said they would prefer; and that it is desirable for Europe not to rush its decisions on this very important issue. I was grateful for the right hon. Gentleman's brief comments on this. A preliminary study of the space tug element of the proposals is being undertaken by the European Space Conference, and the United Kingdom's share of the cost of this study will amount to about £50,000 over the next six months or so.

British industry has been officially invited by the Department to express its views on participation in the post-Apollo programme, and contacts are being made by the industry with U.S. firms involved in the programme. British officials are collaborating closely with the European space organisations in exploratory contacts with N.A.S.A. and the American companies concerned, and on Tuesday and Wednesday last they attended a presentation by N.A.S.A. in Bonn of its current thinking.

N.A.S.A. and its two prime contractors for the studies of the proposed shuttle launcher gave, in Bonn, a full presentation of their current thinking on the launcher development, the associated technological research programme, and the so-called space tug. It provided a valuable opportunity to ensure that all the 300 people present representing European Governments and European industry were fully and equally informed about N.A.S.A.'s plans, and the opportunities for European participation in this part of the N.A.S.A. post-Apollo programme.

The European Governments concerned will be considering the many issues which arise from N.A.S.A.'s invitation to Europe at the forthcoming European Space Conference. It is not intended that this will reach decisions about participation, nor is this expected by the Americans. It will, however, be important to reach agreement about the next steps to be taken by Europe towards establishing a basis for decision, and about the formal machinery for handling discussions and eventually negotiations with the U.S. authorities. The British Government are at one with their partners in Europe in seeking to arrive at a multilateral European response on the broad issues of policy involved.

The key elements of the American programme, that is, the space shuttle, space station and space tug, will unundoubtedly, as the hon. Gentleman knowns, revolutionise space technology and are likely to have technical implication reaching far beyond space activities. Europe could scarcely afford to follow the same line independently. But the costs of participation on any significant scale would be considerable and there is still much uncertainty about the best means of participation.

Mr. Dalyell

I am listening very attentively to the hon. Gentleman. Could some indication, not necessarily in the immediate future, be given to British industry of how realistic is the offer of the American Government and N.A.S.A. to allow British industry genuinely to participate? There is a feeling of wonderment about this.

Mr. Price

I accept the hon. Member's point entirely, but it is a little too early. This is part of what we and our European colleagues are investigating. There would be, for example, a clear implication for European launcher policy in the event of Europe, through its participation in the post-Apollo programme, having access to means of putting its satellites into orbit. To pursue the development of a conventional launcher would mean pursuing an obsolescent line of space technology. E.L.D.O. is at the preliminary stage of studies of a new and more powerful "conventional" launcher known as Europa III which would probably come into service at the end of the 1970's. Whether or not this will, in practice, be realised obviously depends in part on whether or not it will be overtaken by space shuttle developments and also on the extent to which American launchers would be available for European space requirements. These are all matters which will be discussed at the forthcoming European Space Conference.

This obviously is as far as I can go today. These are still early days in European consideration of the post-Apollo offer. However, I can assure the hon. Member and his right hon. Friend that their interest and enthusiasm are much appreciated by my right hon. and learned Friend and myself, and the more discussion there is of these problems, both in the House and outside, the better.

I am sure that it is important for the future of our country and of our continent that we maintain our interest, indeed our enthusiasm for space activities. However, we have a very difficult problem of selection over the whole spectrum of high technology projects. Without intelligent selection the cost to the taxpayer could be grievous. Nevertheless, I believe that we have got to marry prudent public financing with imagination for the future.

Mr. Benn

Will the hon. Gentleman give me his latest estimate of the cost of participation? My recollection is that we are talking about something in the region of another Concorde. I hope that the hon. Gentleman has not read into the comments I made an enthusiasm without a proper assessment of what the cost would be and the benefits of alternative spends of manpower and money.

Mr. Price

I agree entirely that that is the key question, but I have no hard facts to give to the House. Discussions have not gone far enough for me to be able to give any hard facts. As I said earlier, on the information avialable even within the total N.A.S.A. post-Apollo programme there is a wide range of figures.

Mr. Dalyell

In case there should be any misunderstanding, I also register that I am not a total romantic.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at twenty-eight minutes past Four o'clock.