Hansard

First, I congratulate Richard Lochhead for securing the debate. He obviously has a better relationship when it comes to Parliamentary business, because that is something that I failed to do in more than five years of working with the sector.

Secondly, I recognise the fact that the concept of the Scottish space sector has gained cross-party participation and support. It is great to see that Lorna Slater has supported the motion, because I know that the Greens have had some issues with the sector in the past. However, I do not think that there are any Green Party members in the chamber for the debate, which is disappointing. Adam Tomkins famously put out a tweet a few years ago that ridiculed the concept of Scotland’s space sector as pie in the sky. It is great to see the Conservatives on board, too.

It has been recognised that there is work to be done to raise public recognition of what the Scottish space sector is all about and how people can be involved in its success, as, over time, it will no doubt become one of Scotland’s mainstay sectors. Indeed, work to analyse the relative sizes of different sectors and what they contribute to the economy was done as part of the national strategy for economic transformation. Over the coming years, the space sector has the scope to replace some of the activity from sectors that perhaps will not be with us for ever.

As has been highlighted, Scotland has significant advantages. Our geography allows us to do sun-synchronous and polar orbits, which is a huge advantage. The end-to-end capability that we have from satellite manufacture, rocket manufacture, launch capability, data analytics and ground stations is unique in Europe and probably globally. We are focused on building on that capability.

It was a real pleasure to work with the sector over that period; it is hugely dynamic. I pay tribute to Craig Clark and Dr Hina Khan at Space Scotland; to Malcolm Macdonald and the team at the Scottish space academics forum; and to the work of the Scotland international space advisory committee. Under that tremendous initiative, a group of global Scots self-organised into a sector-based group and came forward with excellent proposals, which gave Scotland’s space sector true global reach into some significant parts of the global sector. I am sure that the minister will look to roll out that model across other sectors with regard to the global Scots network.

I was delighted to engage with Mangata three times during the journey when Scottish Enterprise and others were involved in landing its investment in Scotland. I am delighted that that came to fruition. Not only will it take manufacturing to the next level, which will allow Mangata to build satellites of up to 1,000kg, but the work that it is doing on the 5G network locally and beyond will be a real asset to Scotland’s broader connectivity ambitions.

I look forward to publication of the innovation strategy. Our space sector has a strong position as one of our key horizontal enabler sectors and that will further cement the sector’s place.

Paul Sweeney made an important point about regulations. Responsibility for the legislation lies with the UK Government, as the policy is reserved. It is important to make progress on the role of the Civil Aviation Authority, which I have met a number of times to discuss the matter. The pressure on it needs to be kept up; the sector wants us to do that to ensure that the CAA delivers on its end of the bargain.

Points about sustainability have been well made. Scotland’s focus is on space for good and on sustainability. As the minister said, Scotland is the first country in the world to have a space sustainability road map, which is a lesson to the sector in other parts of the globe, where people are watching with interest what we are doing in moving into new space. We are moving away from the traditional focus on defence and large satellites to something that will have a huge impact on our ability to tackle the challenges of climate change and net zero as we move through this decade and into the next.

Over the past few days, I have spoken to people in the sector to gauge how the minister and the Government could work increasingly closely with them to take forward opportunities together to develop the sector. The concept of a national space mission has been raised with me previously, and it was good to see more feedback on what shape that might take. I will highlight four areas where the sector has identified that more work needs to be done, as we build the sector, as it moves into the next phase of its maturity and as we secure Scotland’s place in the £490 billion market.

The first area is skills. All the speakers so far have discussed the importance of attracting skills into the sector and of using the sector’s attractiveness to drive the broader STEM agenda in schools across Scotland. It is great that work is happening in some schools locally—I commend that—but a programme to work with education colleagues in the Government and make that a more significant part of our STEM education efforts would be welcome.

Another part of the skills agenda that we should not forget is talent attraction, particularly from the rest of the UK. With the industry advisory group for rest-of-the-UK talent attraction, I was taking forward hugely important work, which space and aerospace were a key part of. It was great to hear the Cabinet Secretary for Constitution, External Affairs and Culture say yesterday that that work will continue. I encourage the minister to make himself aware of that work, if he is not leading on it, and to ensure that it continues to attract talent from the rest of the UK to the Scottish space sector and other sectors.

The second area is international aspects and, to be frank, what I call space diplomacy—Scotland leveraging its excellent position in the sector to best effect in raising Scotland’s profile globally. I engaged in that with a number of countries, including Luxembourg, Ireland and Switzerland. Malaysia is probably the standout example. In Singapore in February, I met the Malaysian space delegation, which was extremely keen to engage with Scotland on a number of levels and had a detailed plan to do that. I encourage the minister to take that work forward with a visit from the Malaysian space delegation to Scotland as quickly as is feasible.

The third area is infrastructure. The sector has asked for engine and platform test capability, integration capability and facilities that can be shared across businesses in the sector, including growth space, which Daniel Johnson highlighted, to allow the sector to build on the progress that it has made, to expand further and to encourage growth businesses.

The sector’s fourth point, which is a bit more ambitious but which the Government should look at, is about co-designing and launching satellites on the Government’s behalf, not only to stimulate the sector and businesses, particularly on the downstream data side, but to highlight and make a statement about Scotland’s seriousness in developing the sector. Data that came from a satellite or constellation would benefit Scotland’s people and Scotland as a whole, particularly on our net zero agenda. There are many examples of where space data—on heat in buildings or other aspects of the net zero agenda—could be extremely valuable.

The sector has given a number of pointers that I hope that the minister will consider. As always, I remain available to support the growth of Scotland’s space sector in whatever way I can.