Apparently, Canada is reassessing its future in space:

The federal government has turned down a request by Canada's space industry to support a contract that would have allowed the companies to build the European Space Agency's Mars surface rover, CBC News has learned.

The decision stunned the companies and has left the ESA scrambling to find a new partner, as no European firm is adequately prepared to match the technical abilities of Canadian firms to build its ExoMars rover.

This points out once again that government space programs are first and foremost jobs programs. If having the best robotics (which at least in theory might translate into the best science) were really important to the Europeans, they'd simply send CSA the money, and hire them as a contractor. But space development funds are not allowed to cross borders. ESA insists that each government get an amount of work on its projects in proportion to each member nation's contributions. Now they'll have to spend a lot of money for one of the European partners to get up to speed, and it will result in schedule delays, cost overruns, and risk of failure, all because (at least) when it comes to space, they don't believe in comparative advantage.

We will make much more progress on the high frontier when it starts to pay for itself, and management decisions can be made independently of politics.

Rand, perhaps a better opening line would be:

"ESA is a lousy customer" although that is not necessarily the fault of ESA engineers.

It also appears to me that the Europeans were hoping to leverage the Canadian taxpayer into supporting the ESA mission on a Canadian dime. Looks like the Canadian taxpayers just said "no" -- but maybe some diplomatic intervention can reverse the decision.

NASA may not be a much better customer. Two summers ago at the Space Frontier gathering in Las Vegas the audience was amused by tales of how a Canadian company had to complete a large stack on ITAR paperwork in order to accept a repair contract to repair a robot the Canadians had made in the first place.

Now, if there were a privately owned space venture situated in Singapore, they could buy globally and make rational choices about which equipment provided the best value based solely on performance and price.

It also appears to me that the Europeans were hoping to leverage the Canadian taxpayer into supporting the ESA mission on a Canadian dime.

Of course they were. That's what "international cooperation" is all about. And Canada would have been part of the mission. The point remains that they could still have access to Canada's robotics expertise if they'd be willing to pay for it. But that's not how government space programs work (Russia on ISS was an exception, but that was foreign aid disguised as a space program).

And if I were a Canadian citizen I would lobby my government to reverse this decision. Strongly lobby, and its Ottawa, right?

Hopefully, the Canadian robotic companies can rally public opinion on this point.

But when you sell to governments these things happen even if being a government contractor can be a lucrative career choice if you know how to play the game.

Trust me, those of us who live in Ottawa (and elsewhere) are already making as much noise as we can. This was a complete shock, and a heartbreaker for those of us who've been fighting to work on this mission.