Labour’s softening stance towards China reinforced by dropped spy case | Foreign policy

Once, before the election, Labor’s approach to China was straightforward. The party has vowed to declare China’s systematic oppression of the Uyghur Muslim minority as genocide. MPs came together to support a genocide amendment to the 2021 trade bill, voting with Conservative rebels and failing to defeat Boris Johnson’s government by just 11 votes.

But recriminations began to escalate last week after the case against two Britons accused of spying for China was dropped. The government’s refusal to identify China as a national security threat has strengthened Labour’s already softened approach to Beijing and sharpened the focus on the figure at its heart: Keir Starmer’s national security adviser Jonathan Powell.

Critics say Labor is seeking a rapid return to the “golden age” rapprochement led by David Cameron in 2015, when Chinese President Xi Jinping made a state visit and Beijing was given the go-ahead to build nuclear power plants in the UK.

This collapsed after China crushed the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong and repeatedly engaged in cyberespionage against British targets. Beijing then became a “determined facilitator” in supporting Russia’s war in Ukraine with critical components.

“There was a strong sense of moral conviction in the opposition about Labour’s China policy,” said Luke de Pulford, director of the China International Parliamentary Alliance, a cross-party group of China-skeptical lawmakers. “This now appears to have been set aside in favor of a focus on trade and investment sacrificed on the altar of perceived economic gain.”

In the run-up to the election, Labor had already lightened its policy burden. his manifestoHe promises a “long-term and strategic approach” towards China that will be created by “monitoring our bilateral relations”.

At the same time, threats from China continued. It took three years to recover from an attack that accessed details of 40 million voters in China between 2021 and 2022, the Electoral Commission’s director general said last month.

The head of MI5 warned in October 2023 that Chinese state actors were approaching an estimated 20,000 Britons on LinkedIn in the hope of stealing industrial secrets. In May 2024, more than a quarter million military payroll records were compromised by Chinese hackers.

Powell, who was Tony Blair’s chief of staff between 1995 and 2007, arrived as national security adviser in November; in fact, he was the prime minister’s most important geopolitical advisor. A political appointee, he is the first special adviser to hold the role, reporting to Starmer.

A veteran of Northern Ireland peace talks, Powell founded Inter-Mediate, a charity that aims to promote dialogue between the parties to the conflict. “If we want to secure lasting peace, then we must engage not only with our loved ones but also with our enemies,” he said in an article published in the Guardian in September 2021.

After the Labor Party’s election victory, other figures were also trying to influence China policy. A few months before his nomination (and brief appointment) as the UK’s ambassador to the US, Peter Mandelson – the only Labor Party figure. vote against the genocide amendment He said Britain had gone too far in falling out with China. “We need a relationship that allows us to cooperate with China when wanted and necessary,” he told the South China Morning Post in September 2024.

Labor backtracked on a pledge to label the Uyghur repression as genocide in October 2024, ahead of then-foreign secretary David Lammy’s visit to Beijing.

A month later, Starmer met Xi at the G20 summit in Rio de Janeiro, where leaders of the two countries met for the first time since 2018. Other talks followed. Chancellor Rachel Reeves visited in January and said the UK should have “pragmatic and good relationships” with countries around the world.

He returned with the promise of investing £600 million over five years, but some experts argued this was a poor return. “Less than a billion should not have been able to get out of bed,” said Sophia Gaston, a senior research fellow at King’s College London.

Powell visited Beijing this July and met with Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi. On the website of the Chinese embassy. In the statement made by China, it was said: “Powell expressed Britain’s willingness to develop dialogue.” Starmer will visit China, perhaps next year.

China, meanwhile, was excluded from the enhanced tier of the Foreign Influence Registration Scheme (Firs) when it launched in July. It is only occupied by Russia and Iran.

The enhanced tier requires anyone engaging in a wide range of political and economic activities in the UK on behalf of a foreign power or organization to declare their activities to the government or face sanctions. Amid Beijing’s threats of retaliation, even a proposal to staff China’s military and espionage apparatus only at the top level has not been implemented.

The promised Chinese audit was never made public; experts argued that it was very difficult to publish a clear document. Instead, it was included in the UK national security strategy published by Powell’s team at the Cabinet Office in late June, which promised “greater robustness and consistency” in relations with Beijing.

It is against this backdrop that Stephen Parkinson, director of the Crown Prosecution Service, revealed this week that for “months” before August, backbencher Alicia Kearns had tried and failed to obtain what she thought was the assurance she needed to prosecute former parliamentary aide Christopher Cash and his friend Christopher Berry. Both men were accused of spying for China, passing information from Westminster to the country’s ruling politburo; but they denied the accusations.

Parkinson had asked UK deputy national security adviser Matthew Collins to testify that China was now “a threat to the national security of the UK”. However, when it became clear that no explanation would come, he gave up the case.

Starmer, who visited India on Thursday, said it was “absolutely clear that no minister was involved” in decisions about what evidence to present. Downing Street aides emphasized that the denial extended to Powell.

The allegation that China was trying to obtain information from Westminster was a new allegation, unlike accusations of hacking or industrial espionage. However, due to circumstances that are still unclear, the trial of Cash and Berry did not begin because the director of public prosecutions could not get what he wanted from the government machinery.

Whoever was at fault, it amounted to “a disgusting judgment about what would upset the Chinese”, according to one former senior member of Whitehall.

Gaston, a foreign policy expert, argues that any relationship with Beijing must always be conducted with trust. “As the government seeks to reset its relationship with China, the last thing we want is to send a message that there are any limitations on its ability to defend national security and that we may not have all the right tools to adequately protect our democracy,” he said.