UK-Taiwan Friendship and Co-operation

Alicia Kearns Excerpts

Thursday 10th February 2022 Commons Chamber

[Alicia Kearns (Rutland and Melton) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House notes the importance of the UK’s relationship with Taiwan; calls on the Government to continue to work towards the strengthening of the UK-Taiwan trade relationship and deepening of security cooperation; and further calls on the Government to support Taiwan’s recognition in the international community.

An island like our own, Taiwan is a democracy where free markets and the rule of law are valued and upheld. Reverence of liberty and respect for fair governance are treasured by the Taiwanese, just as they are in countries across the free world. Yet Taiwan is also unique. It has a beautiful culture born out of the many peoples and countries that have touched the island. Within this diversity, the Taiwanese show elements of a common culture with their Chinese cousins. They speak Mandarin, and they gather every year to celebrate the same traditions as those on the Chinese mainland. For example, just this month, millions of Taiwanese celebrated the beginning of the lunar new year, and I am sure everyone will join me in wishing them well in the year of the tiger.

However, Taiwan has always been distinct. Following the fall of the Ming dynasty in 1644, Taiwan was ruled separately from the emergent Ching dynasty in Beijing. The Kangxi Emperor, who ruled China for longer than any other, said of the island:

“We gain nothing by possessing it, and it would be no loss if we did not acquire it.”

[Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)]

To what extent does my hon. Friend believe that, following our withdrawal from Afghanistan, the Government of China are watching very closely our resolve in the face of threats to Ukraine, as they assess what they might do with regard to their ambitions in the South China sea?

[Alicia Kearns]

I thank my right hon. Friend for that comment, and he is absolutely right that autocratic Governments across the world are now questioning our resolve and questioning our ability to go in and defend our neighbours, particularly to uphold the values of democracy. I will elucidate that point more if he gives me a little time.

While the pomposity of that comment and attitude about Taiwan does not reflect the immense value of this nation, it does highlight the novelty of the Chinese claims to the island. China did not always claim the right to govern Taiwan, and that is important in understanding the current tensions as we look at recent developments.

Taiwan has not always been the democracy we see today. The years after the second world war saw the emergence of a one-party nationalist state, with widespread political repression. At the beginning of the 1980s, however, Taiwan pursued democratic reform. Building on the rapid economic growth post war, the island became a multi-party, rules-based democracy. This transformation was known as the Taiwan miracle. The Economist global democracy index now shows just how far Taiwan come. I doubt many Members would know that Taiwan is ranked as the 11th most democratic country on earth and the No. 1 most democratic country in Asia, according to The Economist, which is a quite outstanding achievement.

Taiwan is therefore the living, breathing truth that societies rooted in Chinese culture are capable of developing into free market, democratic and rules-respecting members of the international community. It is this truth that explains why the Chinese Communist party fears Taiwan so greatly, because as long as Taiwan exists, the world will know that Government need not be defined by control, repression and even genocide, as we have seen under the Chinese Communist party. When Xi Jinping claims that Taiwan has always been part of China, he is using a false narrative to pursue his political agenda.

[Christine Jardine (Edinburgh West) (LD)]

Does the hon. Member agree with me that the problem we have at the moment is that there seems to be an absence of strategy from the Government towards China and its relationship with Taiwan? Does she feel that we do need something urgently to fill that gap or, as the right hon. Member for New Forest West (Sir Desmond Swayne) said, China will be looking very closely at our reactions and perhaps its own actions will be influenced by that lack of strategy?

[Alicia Kearns]

I thank the hon. Lady, and I very much agree that we need a cross-Government strategy on China. However, I think she will probably hear from the Minister later some relief on that subject, because I believe that a cross-Government strategy is currently being developed. It looks as though the officials in the Box are relieved that I am saying so, but we will wait to hear about that later.

[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

Some people have often said that China has adopted a patient attitude to Taiwan and thinks that eventually it will somehow fall into China’s lap. Is it not important that we have a cross-party, cross-House and whole-nation approach to this in the UK, and do we not have just as deep a well of patience as China?

[Alicia Kearns]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman. China believes it is in the ascendancy and needs simply to wait it out until the UK and the US lose their ability to maintain an international rules-based order, and then it can occupy Taiwan. He puts it very well when he says that we too are watching and we too will wait, and we will stand by our allies. He is absolutely right that we need a cross-party approach, and I believe that under the chairmanship of my hon. Friend the Member for Tonbridge and Malling (Tom Tugendhat) we see exactly that on the Foreign Affairs Committee.

The current tensions in Taiwan must be seen for what they are: the direct result of the emergence of democracy and the Chinese Communist party’s own insecurity about a modern, successful and democratic Chinese society. When people ask why we should care about an island on the other side of the globe, the answer is simple. Taiwan represents the best of democracy, and the United Kingdom must always take the side of democracy and our friends who are trying to uphold its values.

Over the past few years, we in this House have watched with dismay as the Chinese Communist party has stripped away the freedoms and liberties of our friends in Hong Kong. The implementation of the national security law has transformed a vibrant and open society into a repressive, Orwellian nightmare, where a teenager faces prison for voicing slightly critical views on social media. While we all mourn the loss of those freedoms, I urge hon. Members not to fall into a state of resignation; our friends in Taiwan need more than that.

Therefore, I will discuss three areas that bind the interests of the United Kingdom to Taiwan: further economic co-operation, international recognition, and security and regional stability. The UK and Taiwan already enjoy a fruitful trading relationship: £7.2 billion of goods and services were exchanged in 2020 alone. Taiwan, as we all know, is the leading producer of semiconductor chips, the micro-engines of our modern world. From mobile phones to the fighter planes that make up the Royal Air Force, the importance of those chips cannot be overstated, but there has been a shortage in recent years, leading both the European Union and USA to implement strategies to maintain their access. We must do the same.

Sensing an opportunity, the Chinese Communist party is already moving to try to dominate this market, although I suspect it will not be able to because of the high-quality workmanship needed to create the chips. Only last year, China purchased the UK’s largest producer of semiconductor chips, Newport Wafer Fab. I opposed the takeover, as did the Foreign Affairs Committee, and I urge the Government to continue to do more to protect industries of special national interest. We cannot be selling them off. We must seek to produce, to protect our own production capabilities and to foster trading relationships with democracies that will protect supply chains.

A trade deal with Taiwan would not only ensure access to semiconductor chips, but help the UK to achieve our net zero targets without compromising on our morals. In my Rutland and Melton constituency there is a 2,175-acre solar plant proposed on good agricultural land, which is being developed by a de facto Chinese company with supply chains reaching into Xinjiang, the site of the Chinese Communist party’s genocide. I will not see Rutland’s soil tainted by mass human rights atrocities. I urge the Government to pursue a bilateral trade deal, because we know Taiwan produces quality solar panels free of Uyghur blood labour.

Taiwan is a country committed to net zero by 2050, producing high-quality green technology, and it shares our democratic morals. What better partner for a trade deal? Let us strike one and begin to develop the alternative supply chains we need to free Taiwan and to a lesser extent ourselves from economic reliance on the Chinese mainland. Let us focus on high-quality technologies and renewables. There is opportunity for us and for them.

The UK is also in the process of joining the comprehensive and progressive agreement for trans-Pacific partnership. We have recognised the shift in global wealth and power towards the Indo-Pacific, and global Britain is rightly stepping up to that. As we pivot towards Asia, however, we must have someone to lean on. Taiwan could play an important role there.

We are all aware of the limitations placed on Taiwan globally: despite having the 21st largest economy and a population of 24 million, it is still barred from meaningful participation in much of the international order. Although tens of millions of passengers pass through its airports, Taiwan has not been represented at the International Civil Aviation Organization since 2014. That is illogical, and the UK must support its readmittance to that body.

[Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making a powerful case for Taiwan’s place in the international community and its role in international bodies. Does she agree that this is not just about Taiwan, but about us as well? What we have seen from the absence of Taiwan’s voice on the World Health Organisation is a worse performance against covid, the Wuhan virus that emerged under Chinese tutelage. Does she agree that we are seeing a damaged response and a worsened ability of the British people to protect themselves because China has decided, for its own selfish reasons, to bully and silence Taiwan?

[Alicia Kearns]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. There is no question but that the Taiwanese response to covid was transparent. It was one of friendship, education and reaching out, yet the international community somehow closed their doors to it. Not only is Taiwan barred from the World Health Organisation and World Health Assembly, but it was expelled from its observer position. That is not acceptable for a country that had impressive contact tracing and border controls, and a rejection of the Orwellian restrictions that other countries put in place.

[Stephen Kinnock (Aberavon) (Lab)]

The hon. Lady is making an excellent speech. As she rightly pointed out, Taiwan is a beacon not only of liberal democracy but of scientific co-operation, and it has shown huge expertise in the way it dealt with the covid-19 pandemic. She has rightly called for Taiwan to be readmitted with observer status to the WHO. What specific and tangible steps does she think the British Government should be taking to lobby the international community to make that happen? When does she think we should start seeing more tangible action from the British Government in that context?

[Alicia Kearns]

We know there are partners across the world who wish to support us in upholding the rights and opportunities of our democratic partners. We should be forming constellations of alliances in every multilateral organisation and zone, where we lobby and work together, whether that is ensuring that we get the right president of Interpol, or ensuring that we have friends such as the Taiwanese at the table or with observer status. Those are things that the UK can lead on, because no nation in the world is better at convening other nations than the UK. If we put our mind to it, we can achieve it.

We must be careful to avoid an unnecessary clash with China in which Taiwan is caught in the middle and becomes collateral damage. The current settlement has maintained peace for 40 years, and we should never underestimate the importance and value of peace. We must therefore be careful in the framing of our relationship and duties to Taiwan. The emergence of full-blown US-China or UK-China strategic rivalry risks increasing Taiwan’s place in political rhetoric between our nations, or it becoming a lightning rod for international agitation and a signal, or a de facto signal, of how strongly a country is or is not standing up to the Chinese Communist party. While that might be easy, or even attractive, to fall into, our Taiwanese friends deserve more meaningful engagement from all of us in this place; it should not be because Taiwan is a useful pawn in our wider competition or debates. I urge the Minister to ensure that we pursue meaningful engagement with Taiwan and that we act tactfully. When I call for Taiwan to have greater international recognition, it is on account of its democracy, its expertise and its status as a free-market friend; not as a tool in a wider struggle.

There are things we can learn from Taiwan, and we must, as we establish this new constellation of alliances around the world. We must also be alert to the risk of framing Taiwan as the smaller cousin of a great beast. It deserves better than that. The Taiwanese are not an embattled people withstanding increasing pressure from the authoritarian communist mainland, which sits waiting to launch an invasion. Taiwan is a strong, thriving economy and society, and a friend, and we must support it in the measured and diplomatic manner that it deserves.

Our first step would be a round of ministerial visits, and I hope the Minister can arrange reciprocal visits, particularly with a Minister at Cabinet level who could represent all of Government, given that we recognise the restrictions on the engagement of particular Departments. I also call for formal recognition to be given to the Taipei representative office, and for meaningful political dialogue. Indeed, His Excellency—I call him that on purpose—the ambassador of Taiwan is observing this debate today; he joins us in the Chamber, and I am sure we all wish to extend our welcome to him. What a gesture it would be if we were to consider granting his office, which serves Taiwan with great distinction, legal diplomatic status.

I have already spoken about the strength of Taiwan’s democracy, the unique culture of its people, and the immense contribution it can and wants to make internationally. But all that is at risk. The 40 years of peace preserved under the principle that Taiwan is a part of China, which we recognise but do not necessarily believe in fully, is being tested. Xi Jinping has committed himself to the political reunification, or “the great rejuvenation” as he calls it, of Taiwan and China, including through the use of force. Already in 2022, in just 27 days, Taiwan has suffered over 148 threatening flights by Chinese aircraft into the air defence identification zone, threatening the Taiwanese air force through a concerted campaign to erode its confidence, as well as grievous aggravations in the Taiwan strait.

The UK is committed to the international rules-based order and I welcome that the Royal Navy’s flagship, the Queen Elizabeth, went to the Taiwan strait last year. I praise the Government for getting Taiwan on the agenda of the recent G7 meeting under our presidency. This is the sort of forward-thinking engagement that we need, but we must do more.

We cannot sit back and wait for any tragedies, such as those in Hong Kong, to occur again. We must act, and we must act now. I ask the Minister to work with our allies around the world, to engage with those nations that respect freedom and have the same concerns that we do, to set in place deterrents and diplomacy to protect our Taiwanese friends, and to ensure we are monitoring, perhaps in the conflict zone that was recently established, the increasing grey-zone hostilities against Taiwan, so that we can measure the incremental and subtle escalations that are taking place.

We also need to look at resilience building with our Taiwanese friends, whether helping them counter disinformation campaigns, developing supply chain resilience or ensuring they can retain access to markets worldwide, which will surely be one the first places that China will seek to hurt them. We have all been impressed by the swift actions of this Government in Ukraine, but now we must show that we are truly a global Britain and will act worldwide.

[Andrew Rosindell (Romford) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this debate, which is long overdue. On that point, the Foreign Secretary has been in Russia this week, showing steely determination to stand up to Russia about the way it is behaving with Ukraine. Do we need the same kind of steely determination shown towards Beijing over its attitude towards Taiwan and Hong Kong, and its general behaviour in that part of the world?

[Alicia Kearns]

My hon. Friend has long been an advocate and friend of the Taiwanese people. The issue is that for too long autocratic countries around the world have seen no cost when they escalate, escalate and escalate. Whether is it Dodik in Bosnia, Putin in Ukraine and around our near neighbourhood, or China in Hong Kong, and whether domestically or in the countries around them, I fear greatly that we fail to bring costs to bear that matter, at our own peril.

Let us look at the situation in Ukraine. Putin has achieved much in the past few weeks. We have given him the world status that he has been craving, with America, France and England all going to Moscow to be called equal to him on the world stage. We have given tacit agreement to him that those borders that he has already occupied are now his to keep. “Just don’t go any further,” we say. That is not enough. That is not a cost. Putin has won greatly in the past few weeks.

While we all recognise the threats facing democracy today, how we in this place respond matters, because it will define the future of the United Kingdom. Around the world, Parliaments are watching us and listening to us. How we respond now will define the rest of this century, and our children’s children’s future. We are proud of our country for its role in protecting democracy in the past, and we must channel that pride into action. I urge all Members to raise their voices in support of Taiwan.

Let us strike a trade deal that benefits our economy and supports our ally; support their democratic values and their strength in being the No.1 democracy in Asia; and give Taiwan’s representatives in the UK the legal status they need. I call for Taiwan to be given a voice internationally, and to be readmitted to both the World Health Organisation and the International Civil Aviation Organisation.

Most importantly, let us ensure that everyone knows that we in this place stand clearly behind the US, as the main guarantor of Taiwan’s security, and our allies in the preservation of peace and stability in the Taiwan strait. We know that Taiwan has much to offer to the world. As our friend, it is our duty to ensure that its contribution is heard, accepted and embraced.

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[Tom Tugendhat]

The hon. Gentleman will know very well that this country recognises that peoples in our community have the right to self-determination. In China, sadly, that has been taken away from people. I agree entirely that there are many peoples who the Chinese state calls Chinese, but who call themselves something else. We have always recognised that people choose their status, not Governments.

Let me come back to Taiwan and why the debate is so important. Many of us are focusing, understandably, on what is going on in Moscow. We are focusing on the journey that my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary took today to see her opposite number, Mr Lavrov. We are focused on the fact that we are seeing physical threats to borders in Europe for the first time since 2014—and that was the first time that had happened since 1945. We are seeing genuine aggression against free and sovereign people in a way that we have not in 60 or 70 years, except for in the case of the annexation of Crimea, South Ossetia, Abkhazia and, of course, Donetsk and Luhansk.

We are also seeing dictatorships trying to undermine democracies. We are seeing it because they have shown it to us. The relationship between Mr Putin and Mr Xi is extremely concerning. They have advertised it to us; they met in order to demonstrate their commitment to each other, and to undermining democracy and freedom around the world. That is why we are talking about Taiwan today. We are seeing a real moment in global politics—a point when we are more vulnerable than we have been for a long time. We see, sadly, a diversion of attention in Washington, confusion in Brussels, and a proliferation of different ideas, thoughts and challenges in Paris, Berlin and Rome.

We are seeing steel in Vilnius and Warsaw, and among many partners and friends. But sadly we are not seeing it as widely as we need to. That is exposing us to a double-edged risk—perhaps not just the risk that Russia may invade Ukraine. It may; 125,000 troops on the border suggests that it is possible. But Russia may also use this opportunity to demonstrate that there is confusion and division in the west, and use that to convince friends and allies that the deals that it has made in the last 20 or 30 years are no longer valid, and that they should bow down to Beijing and Moscow instead. That would be much more damaging to our long-term future, our peoples’ liberties, and our economic prosperity than many other decisions that could be taken. What is worse, the decision to do that in Ukraine would open up an opportunity to think about doing the same in Taiwan.

It is certainly true that any military invasion of Taiwan would be extremely difficult. The Chinese military—the People’s Liberation Army Navy, as it is somewhat bizarrely called—has been developing an amphibious capability that it thinks puts it in with a chance of a successful landing on Taiwan’s shores. I know—we all know—that is what it is doing; it is not a secret.

[Alicia Kearns]

I apologise for interrupting my hon. Friend when he is making such a good point, but does he agree that, very concerningly, some of the research, intelligence and information that underpin some of those new technological advances that China is making are coming from British universities, British researchers and British companies, where espionage is at large? It is funding them quite openly, yet there seems to be no accountability in academia for the selling of what should be state-protected secrets to somebody who is clearly at odds with our own interests.

[Tom Tugendhat]

I agree entirely with my hon. Friend and I will come back to that point, because she will not be surprised to hear that I wish to build on it.

Those of us who have some experience of fighting in mountains know that it is a lot harder for the attacker than the defender. Those of us who have sadly spent too much time reading stories of Operation Overlord will know that even the short straits that separate us from northern France provided an extremely difficult obstacle for our forebears to get over. So 100 miles of really difficult water to cross on the straits of Taiwan really does present an obstacle. Indeed, the sea state there is often so difficult that only for very short windows is it possible to truly cross. The landing positions that the Chinese forces would need to assault are narrow and therefore likely to afford Taiwanese forces the ability to defend.

I do not think that we should really be looking at the military threat in the classical sense. Instead, we are looking at the military threat in the sense of what we see from Russia in Ukraine and, sadly, from China in other parts of the world. We are seeing an erosion—an erosion of the will to fight, an erosion of the nation state to hold together, and an erosion of the integrity of a society to resist pressure—and that is coming in many, many different ways.

The first, sadly, is in what has become known as fake news: the disinformation campaigns that we are seeing around the world, the extraordinary assaults on our intelligence, our intellect and our ability to talk to one another as equals by spreading the hatred and lies that we see, sadly, too frequently here in the UK, in the United States and in many other countries. We are seeing that being absolutely industrialised in countries such as Ukraine and Taiwan. They are not the sole aim of these targets, but merely the roadblock on the way to the rest, because this is intended to change the way in which the global economy works and the way in which our people—the British people—are able to live their lives and enjoy their futures. It is intended to erode our liberties so that a few rich men in Beijing and Moscow can enjoy their stolen goods and make sure that they sleep at night.

That is not acceptable. We were not elected to this place and charged with being here to sacrifice the freedoms of the British people to a couple of despots in Beijing or Moscow. Standing up with our allies and friends around the world is exactly what we should be doing, but again, this is not just about them, because the techniques that we are seeing in Taiwan and Ukraine are spreading here.

Today, like every day, businesses and individuals in Taipei and across the island will be the subject of quite literally millions of cyber-attacks. They are under such intense assault that it is very difficult to understand how many routine operations can continue, and yet they do. We are seeing the same type of assaults here in the UK—not the same volume, but the same type—and we therefore have a lot to learn from Taiwan in how it resists. The same is true in Ukraine, where we are seeing Russia learning a whole new way of doing warfare by interrupting everything from the electricity grid to the communications networks in order to undermine the capability of the state and society to hold together.

But we are also seeing that here in the UK and that brings me to the point that my hon. Friend the Member for Rutland and Melton so rightly made. We are seeing an erosion of our own freedoms here in the UK, and not just through the dirty money that the Foreign Affairs Committee has been so clear in calling out since 2018. Indeed, I see on the Opposition Front Bench the hon. Member for Hornsey and Wood Green (Catherine West), who was on the Foreign Affairs Committee at the time—promotion for some!

We have been calling this out for a long time because it is fundamentally undermining the prosperity and happiness of the British people. We are seeing properties being over-inflated in value. We are seeing assets being used to undermine us, not to support us. We are seeing assets of community value—football teams and businesses—being used effectively as a piggybank from which cash can be removed on future occasions for pay for operations on behalf of a state that thinks nothing of attempting to murder the Prime Minister of Montenegro, actually murdering a citizen in the United Kingdom using a nuclear substance, using chemical weapons on the streets of Salisbury, blowing up an arms dump in Prague, and threatening literally thousands of people with cold and famine by trafficking them and forcing them into the forests around Belarus to use as weapons against the people of Poland and Lithuania. This is not a co-operative state; it is a hostile state and these are its actions. Here, we need to do more about it. We need to stop the dirty money, which we have called for, but we need to go further, because we are also—this is the tragedy—seeing the erosion of the liberty of some British people. The freedoms that we value are the freedoms that we need to stand for.

Yesterday, sadly, for the 100th or 200th time—I cannot remember how many—I spoke to some students who told me that their debates in their universities were silenced. They said that people were not willing to speak out or to stand up for what they knew was true because they would face the pressure of the Ministry of State Security, China’s enforcement arm, in silencing them in debate here in the UK. I spoke to them about the nature of this interference and they said that sadly it often comes from a fellow student or from a teacher or lecturer who is connected in some way to the state. We are seeing the erosion of the liberty of British citizens and of those who have come here seeking that liberty, whichever country they come from, because we are sadly not robust enough in standing up for it.

We need to close down the Confucius Institutes. They are agencies of a hostile state through the United Front Work Department—an organisation that we in this House have grown used to in recent days because of the works of Christine Lee, who we were all warned about. We have got used to the actions that it has been taking in seeking influence, in the most extraordinary propaganda operation that the world has ever seen, and we have got used to the pernicious effect on our own community.

My hon. Friend the Member for Rutland and Melton spoke about the theft of intellectual property—some of it, sadly, intellectual property that should remain secret. She is absolutely right. Defending state secrets is, after all, an essential role of government. But defending the liberty of British people to study and learn ideas of any kind, of any form, in a free environment at a university or a school, is surely even more fundamental than that. We must maintain absolute freedom of our people to express their views, whether on Tibet, as my hon. Friend did, on the status of Hong Kong, or, as officials in Beijing did only the other day, on the status of the Falkland Islands. They can express their views however they wish. Silencing debate undermines us and erodes freedom. It also erodes our path to the future.

Let me tell the House why I am still optimistic, despite that catalogue of crimes that I think have been committed against us. When I look forward, I see beacons like Taiwan as a demonstration that, actually, free people choose freedom. I see an example showing that Chinese society and culture, in different forms, are intrinsically at home with liberty. I see the writings in the universal declaration of human rights—written by an ambassador from China, P.C. Chang—and I see the rights that are literally encoded in the fundamental documents of the international community. I therefore see the hope that the attempts of the Chinese state—the Communist party—to silence these people will eventually fail, because they will.

What we are seeing coming out of Taiwan is another example of why those attempts will fail. Many people will know that TSMC, the Taiwanese semiconductor chip manufacturer, constitutes an extraordinary demonstration of innovation and capability on the island. It is a fantastic example of the meeting of science and craft, in that it brings together the skills of innovation and the skills of creation. I think it fair to say that it is now one of the keystones of the global economy. Delays caused to its output by various water issues and other problems had a direct effect on the manufacturing of cars and kettles, even here in the UK. It is essential to our global economy, and it is telling that its extraordinary success is based on the free ideas and the creativity that are needed—or, rather, can only be achieved—in a free society. This is a very good reminder that liberty does not just feed the soul; it feeds the pocket, and it feeds prosperity for everyone.

We see people around the world making choices. We see the migrant routes out of various parts of the world, and we see where those migrants go. There are not that many who think that China or Russia is a good idea, but there are many who choose freedom in countries such ours. When I see the threats that are ranged before us, I feel that what we are seeing coming out of Beijing today, and what we are seeing coming out of Moscow today, is much more in keeping with Shakespeare’s King Lear than with Henry V.

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[Bob Stewart]

My very good and hon. Friend is absolutely right. I have said in the Chamber before that if China was to develop a model much like Taiwan, it would be to the benefit of China. Taiwan is the beacon. It is a hugely successful economy. It is good news that there are some 13,000 Taiwanese students in British universities, with 4,000 at postgraduate level. By way of return, which I think is very interesting, there are an increasing number of British students studying in Taiwan. They are mainly learning Mandarin, of course.

[Alicia Kearns]

Earlier, the Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee rightly raised Confucius Institutes. Members may not know that the country with the highest number of Confucius Institutes per head of population is Scotland. That should be of grave concern. Does my right hon. Friend think that, given that Taiwanese people speak Mandarin and write a higher level of more ancient Chinese, we could perhaps look to them to provide more education in Mandarin in this country? Let me make one other quick point on drawing comparisons. Does he find it interesting that the Chinese Government have felt the need to sanction both Taiwanese and British parliamentarians? How shameful it is that they continue to attack our democracies.

[Bob Stewart]

The answer to both of my hon. Friend’s questions is yes and yes. I totally agree. I note that President Tsai Ing-wen has committed Taiwan to having Mandarin and English as dual official languages within eight years, which is tremendous.

I am conscious of time, and I have banged on for longer than I thought I would. [Hon. Members: “Never!”] I always do, for far too long. In summary, we and all people in the world who think like us should do everything we can to defend the democracy and values of Taiwan. Its security challenges and survival as a thriving, successful model mean a great deal to us and to the world.

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[Alicia Kearns]

I thank the Minister for responding to the debate. Above all, I thank every Member who has taken the time to contribute to this important discussion. There is unity throughout the House in respect of our commitment to and friendship with the people of Taiwan, whether from our legal eagles, such as my hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Sir Robert Neill); from our great gallant gentlemen, such as my right hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart); from our foremost foreign policy expert, my hon. Friend the Member for Tonbridge and Malling (Tom Tugendhat); or from great whisky drinkers and human rights advocates, such as the hon. Member for Midlothian (Owen Thompson).

Most of all, there is a clarity of asks and a clarity of purpose in the House. I hope the Minister can go back to the Department and go through the specific, meaningful and tangible asks to see what more can be done. Yes, there is friendship, there is opportunity and there are shared threats, but today Parliament has spoken with one voice, in the fantastic presence of Ambassador Kelly, to whom we are all grateful for his friendship and work. I again thank everyone who came to the debate, because we have made it clear today that Britain stands firmly behind our ally and firmly behind our good friends the people of Taiwan.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House notes the importance of the UK’s relationship with Taiwan; calls on the Government to continue to work towards the strengthening of the UK-Taiwan trade relationship and deepening of security cooperation; and further calls on the Government to support Taiwan’s recognition in the international community.