We kowtow - they chuckle

China’s plans for a mega London embassy embraced by a government ever eager to please even when history shows the folly of this eagerness

Rachel Reeves talks tough : ‘It’s a deal - whatever you want is just fine with us’

British governments have a vainglorious habit of claiming that the UK punches above its weight in international affairs but when it comes to dealing with the People’s Republic of China (PRC) the UK has a habit of punching below its weight. While other nations have realised that dealing with this dictatorship requires a degree of vigour the hapless Brits appear to be mesmerized by the notion that the hard men in Beijing are there to help them.

There is no evidence that making nice with Beijing brings great benefit to Britain, for example during David Cameron’s ‘Golden Era’ of relations with China, British exports to the PRC fell, however they rose in the years 2022 to 2023 when a much tougher line was adopted.

Determined to learn nothing from past experience the new government is reverting to the posture of doing its best to placate China, in this case by seeking to overrule local and security specialist objections to plans for a new mega PRC embassy in the City of London’s former Royal Mint premises.

The proposed embassy will be some 10 times larger than the PRC’s current premises. It will also be bigger than the new US embassy and dwarf all other diplomatic outposts in London.

As usual Beijing has been playing hardball by blocking redevelopment plans for the British embassy in China pending approval of its expansion plans in London.

British security officials are actually aware of the building’s location directly above some of the most sensitive cabling in London and positioned to enhance surveillance capabilities. These concerns have resulted in an uncharacteristic outpouring of leaks and briefings from security sources. While it appears that Yvette Cooper, the Home Secretary, has managed to strong arm the Metropolitan Police into withdrawing its objections she, significantly, has not managed to secure a public endorsement from security officials.

All nations use their embassies for espionage activities but the PRC takes it to a new level which has been exposed in America. In Britain PRC diplomats have openly engaged in violence against protestors outside their premises and their Quisling government in Hong Kong has put a price on the head of UK residents involved in lawfully campaigning for the restoration of freedom in the former British colony. The illicit surveillance conducted by PRC operatives in Britain went as far as establishing illegal police outposts on British soil, the government cannot even confirm that they have been shuttered. As for the work of PRC agents in parliament, among other places, well, Britain is open house for these folk.

All this is quite bad enough but the Starmer government has just appointed a former China lobbyist, Emma Reynolds, as Economic Secretary to the Treasury, to replace Tulip Saddiq who was forced out over her dealings with another foreign power, in this case Bangladesh, previously ruled with an iron fist by her aunt.

Ms Reynolds was involved in lobbying the previous government to exclude China from the "enhanced tier" of the Foreign Influence Registration Scheme, a scheme that has since dropped off the radar.

Meanwhile her boss Rachel Reeves has returned from a totally pointless visit to Beijing brandishing unspecified agreements apparently worth £600m to the UK over the next five years. As ever figures like this are meaningless to the extent that her Chinese counterparts did not even bother to mention them.

Like a long succession of other British ministers who trekked up to Beijing, claiming to have improved relations and raised ‘tough’ issues, Ms Reeves echoed these claims but could not even secure consular access to the publisher and British citizen Jimmy Lai who is languishing in a Hong Kong jail, largely in solitary confinement as he goes on trial for the crime of journalism.

In the unlikely event that the Chancellor of the Exchequer bothered to conduct a reality check of the great economic benefits supposedly secured by countless visits of this kind, she would have discovered that China accounts for a minuscule 0.2 per cent of all foreign direct investment into the UK and that China runs a massive trade surplus with Britain which is on an upward trajectory.

The naivety of British politicians in their dealings with China is bolstered by an institutional bias in the Foreign Office where avid Sinophiles, not least the current British ambassador in Beijing, work ceaselessly to persuade their political masters that whatever they do, they must not annoy the Chinese Communist Party.

Oh, how they must chuckle in the corridors of Zhongnanhai, home to the PRC’s leaders.