Karl von Wogau: Galileo must be financed from the Community Budget

Karl von Wogau (CDU/D), Chairman of the European Parliament's Subcommittee on Security and Defence has explicitly warned of the danger that the current discussion about financing Galileo from the budget of the European Space Agency (ESA) will lead to further delays of this very important project.

At present 1.35 billion Euros are foreseen in the medium-term financial planning of the EU budget for the construction of Galileo as a satellite-based navigation system in the European Union. Deliberations to provide new funds from the ESA budget by contributions of the Member States countries would however mean additional bidding procedures, new participants and expensive co-ordination processes.

As a consequence, this would lead to a further slowing down of the project and to a further loss of future competition ability. Therefore, financing Galileo from the Community budget would be the better way to finally accelerate this very important technology project, as von Wogau concluded.