THE UK Government has issued a new warning that it is ready to walk away from the £9 billion EU Galileo programme and develop its own rival satellite-navigation system.
Sam Gyimah, its Science Minister, said it was "extremely disappointing" Brussels was continuing to block the UK's participation in secure elements of the project in the wake of the Brexit vote.
He said other member states would have to stump up "billions of pounds" in additional funding if the UK - which has already invested £1.2bn in the programme - decided to withdraw.
"The EU is playing hard ball with us," Mr Gyimah told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme.
"We have helped to develop the Galileo system. We want to be part of the secure elements of the system and we want UK industry to be able to bid for contracts on a fair basis. It is only on those terms that it makes sense for the UK to be involved in the project.”
Mr Gyimah stressed that the Galileo programme was of mutual benefit to the UK and the EU and if the UK were not part of it, then it would cost EU members billions of pounds more to develop.
"Because of the implications for us in terms of defence and our national security, were we not to participate in Galileo we would look at alternative options and we will leave nothing off the table. That includes developing a British satellite navigation system," he added.
The UK Space Agency has previously said it has begun feasibility work on a UK system, which could cost a "lot less" than Galileo, due to work already done and "British know-how and ingenuity".
The latest warning came after Airbus said last week that it would be forced to move work on the programme - intended to provide an answer to the US GPS system - out of the UK to its factories in France and Germany.
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