Galileo project to go ahead

EU countries have sorted out a deal to fund the troubled satellite navigation project to rival the US Global Positioning System.

According to Reuters, there was a huge shortfall in start-up cash for the Galileo project which the project organisers wanted to make up using $3.55 billion unspent cash from the EU budget.

The move was opposed by some member States which felt the cash would be better off being spent on giving French farmers subsidy money to stop them bringing their tractors into Paris, or very large EC sponsored lunches.

Germany was against the deal because it feared that its aerospace experts would not be involved in building it, but it was voted down.

However it seems that the EC has come up with a deal that will mean that no one contractor will run the whole project, which apparently means Germany will get some work out of it.

It's estimated that it will cost $5.1 billion to complete the project. The cash has been raised from public money because private companies did not think it would make them enough.

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