UK to demand £1bn if EU blocks satellites

The UK is poised to demand the EU repays up to £1billion if British companies are forced out of the Galileo satellite navigation system. Whitehall sources said that the Brexit department would today publish a paper on the €10 billion Galileo project, which has become a flashpoint in the Brexit negotiations, that would raise the prospect of Britain recovering its investment in the scheme.

BRITAIN is poised to demand the EU repays up to £1billion if the bloc continues to force UK companies out of the Galileo satellite navigation system, The Daily Telegraph understands.

Whitehall sources said that the Department for Exiting the European Union would today publish an uncompromising paper on the Galileo project that would raise the prospect of Britain recovering its investment in the scheme.

The row over Galileo has become a bitter flashpoint in the Brexit negotiations, which reopened in Brussels this week after moves to shut British businesses out of the €10billion (£8.8billion) project on legal grounds.

The UK paper is expected to contain strong language about the EU’S failure to honour promises it made during Brexit talks.

It is expected to argue that the bloc has reneged on the December joint report which said the UK was eligible to participate in EU programmes during the current budget cycle, and that British participants and projects would be “unaffected by the UK’S withdrawal from the union for the entire lifetime of such projects”. During those negotiations, Britain agreed not to request repayment for its share of EU space assets – including more than £1billion of investment in Galileo – on the basis that the UK would be part of the system under a post-brexit security partnership.

Now that UK participation appears to have been ruled out by European Commission lawyers, senior Whitehall sources said the Government was considering its options, “including financial” ones.

The row over Galileo came as Dominic Cummings, the former adviser to Michael Gove and chief strategist of the Vote Leave campaign, wrote a lengthy blog post condemning the “shambles” of Brexit.

He accused Downing Street of “botching” the process by triggering Article 50 without first devising a plan, and warned a “revolution” could be needed to fix the problem.

Mr Cummings wrote: “Unless it changes fast, drastic action will be needed including the creation of new forces to reflect public contempt for both the main parties and desire for a political force that reflects public priorities. If revolution there is to be, better to undertake it than undergo it.”