EUROPEAN SPACE CONFERENCE

HL Deb 05 May 1975 vol 360 cc189-90WA

Earl FERRERS

asked Her Majesty's Government:

What was the outcome of the recent meeting of the European Space Conference.

Lord BESWICK

The European Space Conference (ESC) is the forum within which European Ministers responsible for space affairs have met from time to time. At the meeting of the Conference held in Brussels on 15th April 1975, at which I represented Her Majesty's Government, the principal event was the decision to set up the European Space Agency (ESA), which is to take over the activities of the European Space Research Organisation (ESRO) and selected residual activities of the European Launcher Development Organisation (ELDO). The ESC itself becomes redundant as a result of the creation of the ESA, because the Agency's Council—on which each Member State is to be represented—is to meet when necessary at Ministerial level. The programmes which the Agency is taking over from ESRO are for the development of several scientific satellites, experimental satellites for regional communications, air traffic control, meteorology and maritime communications purposes, a satellite launch vehicle, and a manned laboratory to be carried in the US space shuttle.

Further decisions of the Conference were: approval of the text of the Agency's Convention (which sets out the rights and obligations of Member States and the policy guidelines within which the Agency is to operate); approval of the text of the Final Act of the Conference of Plenipotentiaries (to take place at about the end of May, when the Convention and Final Act are available for signature in all the necessary languages): authorisation of the appointment of the Agency's Directorate including the Director General (who is to be Mr. Roy Gibson, a Briton and acting Director General of ESRO); and agreement that the Agency should contribute to the basic costs of the Kourou (French Guiana) launching site for the period 1976–1980.

The Agency is to come into de facto existence on the day following the Conference of Plenipotentiaries, and the initial Member States are to be Belgium, Denmark, France, West Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. Norway and Austria will each participate in one of the programmes of the Agency without being full members. Other States will be free to apply to become Member States or participating States.

House adjourned at fourteen minutes past seven o'clock.