China: Security and Trade (IRDC Report)

Baroness Anelay of St Johns Excerpts

Thursday 20th October 2022 Grand Committee

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[Baroness Anelay of St Johns]

That the Grand Committee takes note of the Report from the International Relations and Defence Committee The UK and China’s security and trade relationship: A strategic void (1st Report, Session 2021-22, HL Paper 62).

[Baroness Anelay of St Johns (Con)]

My Lords, I am pleased to present our report, The UK and China’s Security and Trade Relationship: A Strategic Void, to the Committee today. I thank members of the International Relations and Defence Committee and our staff, including our specialist adviser Dr Yuka Kobayashi, for all their hard work in producing this report.

The UK-China relationship is complex, of course. It has seen periods of both co-operation and confrontation. When David Cameron was Prime Minister, the focus on economic relations with China was characterised as a “golden era”, but tensions then rose rapidly as a consequence of increased concerns about matters such as security challenges, the imposition of the draconian Hong Kong national security law, and allegations of genocide in China’s Xinjiang province. Against that background, we launched our inquiry and published our report just over a year ago.

The central argument of our report is that the Government do not have a clear strategy on China, despite the shift in relations over the last few years. We found that the attempts made by coalition and Conservative Governments since 2010 to navigate complex interactions between trade, security and human rights had led to inconsistencies and uncertainties. We concluded that there was no clear sense of what the Government’s strategy was towards China, or indeed what values and interests they were trying to uphold in the UK-China relationship.

The Government claimed that they had set out their strategy in various speeches from time to time. We concluded that these did not provide clarity. In our view, the Government seemed to be

“using a policy of deliberate ambiguity to avoid making difficult decisions that uphold the UK’s values but might negatively affect economic relations.”

The committee therefore called upon the Government to produce and publish a “single, coherent China strategy” and a plan for how they would execute that strategy in the future.

The Government’s response did not confirm whether they would publish a written strategy on China. Instead, they referred us to the integrated review of security, defence, development and foreign policy. However, the IR simply alludes to the tension between balancing economic engagement with China with the need to uphold UK values and national security. It does not give any indication about how this tension will be resolved.

During this summer’s leadership contest, the Times reported that my right honourable friend the Prime Minister, then the Foreign Secretary, would class China as a “threat” to national security for the first time. However, the reporting was light on details—it was not clear what classing China as a “threat” would mean in practice, for example—and no further announcements have yet been made on this matter since the Prime Minister took office. What further details can my noble friend the Minister supply about the Government’s plans in this area?

I note that the Government have pledged to update the integrated review, saying that the updated review

“will ensure we are investing in the strategic capabilities and alliances we need to stand firm against coercion from authoritarian powers like Russia and China.”

I welcome the idea of updating the IR, but rumours are going around that it will not appear until next May. In the current volatility of events, one suspects that it may be even further delayed. Will there be any consultation on the key issues before the report is published?

I turn now to five specific issues: Taiwan; supply resilience; human rights; Chinese influence on UK universities; and, finally, the implications of China’s stance on Russia’s illegal and unprovoked invasion of Ukraine.

Our report argued that any assessment of China’s threat to the UK should take into account both the probability and likely consequences of conflict in Taiwan. We argued that the UK’s interests would be directly threatened, and concluded that:

“The uncertainty over the future of Taiwan therefore represents a major risk to the UK.”


The Government’s response to this section of our report provided limited information. It merely stated that the Government

“support a peaceful resolution through constructive dialogue”,

and that

“the numerous Chinese military flights at the beginning of October”—

in 2021—

“near Taiwan were not conducive to peace and stability in the region.”

It was astonishing that there was not a single reference to Taiwan in the integrated review.

Last weekend, the five-yearly Chinese Communist Party congress opened in Beijing. It is expected to endorse an unprecedented third five-year term for Xi Jinping as party general secretary—the de facto President. On the very first day of that congress, he said:

“We insist on striving for the prospect of peaceful reunification with the greatest sincerity and best efforts, but we will never promise to give up the use of force and reserve the option to take all necessary measures.”


I understand the diplomatic sensitivities on this matter but would be grateful if my noble friend the Minister can provide an analysis of the UK’s assessment of risks and a potential response to further developments in Taiwan.

The committee also explored the issue of supply chain resilience and vulnerability in the context of the UK-China relationship. The passage of the Telecommunications (Security) Act 2021 was a clear sign of the Government’s concerns in one area, but these vulnerabilities are much more widespread across the UK economy. We were particularly concerned about vulnerabilities exposed during the pandemic relating to the procurement of PPE and lateral flow tests. In subsequent correspondence, the Government confirmed that, as of 10 January this year, the total cost of lateral flow tests from China and procured by NHS Test and Trace or the UK Health and Security Agency was £5.8 billion.

Of course, it is important that the UK engages with China economically, and our report highlights a number of opportunities for UK businesses, particularly in the services sector. It is also vital to co-operate with China on global challenges, including public health and climate change—a subject on which my noble friend the Minister has particular expertise. This engagement with China should not, however, come at the cost of upholding the UK’s core values, including on human rights and labour protection—values which China does not share.

In April last year, a Motion was passed in the other place declaring that Uighurs and other ethnic and religious minorities in Xinjiang are suffering crimes against humanity and genocide. Our report stressed that the question of how to balance economic engagement with human rights must be front and centre of the Government’s strategy on China. We concluded that the Government cannot “sit on the fence” on this issue, and that they must not tilt the balance towards preserving economic relations at the expense of human rights.

I am pleased to say that the Government’s response indicated that they agree with the committee’s position in this area. In subsequent correspondence, the Government also confirmed that

“serious concerns about human rights violations in Xinjiang naturally inform our position towards China”.

I would therefore be grateful if my noble friend the Minister could give a practical example of how it informs our position What is the effect?

There has been increasing concern that British universities could be a target for technological espionage and that Chinese students in the UK could be put under pressure by the Chinese authorities. Clearly, the Government should seek to maintain the role and popularity of British higher education among Chinese students, but we recommended that the Government and the higher education sector should take steps to ensure that Chinese students can maintain freedom of research. The Government’s brief response to this recommendation did not, however, outline the steps that they intended to take. Moreover, when we raised this with them in subsequent correspondence, they referred us to the measures that they are taking through the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Bill, shortly to go through its next stage in this House. However, the relevance of that Bill to the specific issues facing Chinese students is not clear: the pressure they are facing comes from outside, from the Chinese Government, not from within the UK.

The Bill had its Second Reading on 28 June this year when several Peers raised specific concerns about China’s influence and pressure. When my noble friend Lord Howe wound up the debate for the Government, however, I could not find a single reference to China in his remarks. Can the Minister therefore provide clarity on the steps the Government are taking to protect Chinese students from political pressure from outside the UK and the role, if any, that is played by the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Bill in providing that protection?

Russia’s illegal and unprovoked invasion of Ukraine dominates most of the immediate foreign policy of western leaders, which is of course wholly understandable. It is vital, however, that we do not divert our attention from the activities of the People’s Republic of China, which could be viewed as the biggest long-term threat to our economic and national security. For its part, China has refused to openly condemn Russia’s invasion. It has opposed economic sanctions on Russia. It has abstained or sided with Russia in UN votes on the war. The new NATO strategic concept document agreed earlier this year raised concerns about China’s “deepening strategic partnership” with Russia.

However, China’s support for Russia has not yet been full-throated. As far as we know, it has not provided Russia with significant military assistance and, at the recent meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, President Putin admitted publicly that China has “questions” and “concerns” about the war. How does China’s position on Russia and Ukraine inform the UK’s own position on China? I would be grateful if the Minister could set out the Government’s thinking in this regard.

Engaging with China will always be an enormous challenge, given its economic weight and its fundamental political differences from us. It would be unwise to think that there will be any softening of President Xi’s hard-line policies of competition with western democracies. It is essential for the UK to be aware and wary of the implications of that for our own security, trade and prosperity. The UK’s strategy for its relations with China needs more clarity and certainty than it has had until now. Trade-offs need to be confronted and ambiguities resolved. I hope that the Government will now provide more clarity and fill the strategic void that has beset the UK’s China policy over the last decade. I beg to move.

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[Baroness Anelay of St Johns (Con)]

My Lords, I am very grateful to all those who spoke in this debate and contributed information based on their own expertise. They did so with a great depth and breadth of information, which has advanced the debate. Of course, I also thank my noble friend the Minister. I hope his offer to respond to all the questions posed by the noble Lord, Lord Alton, may be extended to other Members who have spoken today. I appreciate that the officials sitting behind him will be thinking, “Oh no”—or something rather stronger—but I know that the questions were asked with a genuine commitment to ensuring that our relationship with China is on the right track, so we would be grateful for responses to them.

It is always said that the first duty of any Government is to ensure that the defence of their country is secured. Of course, that includes economic security. At the beginning of the debate, I referred to my right honourable friend Liz Truss as Prime Minister, but during the course of the debate she has resigned.

[Baroness Hooper (Con)]

As leader of the party.

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[Baroness Anelay of St Johns (Con)]

As leader of the party—and ipso facto, et cetera. It is a brutal world we inhabit, as we know, but that is the nature of democracy, however it is defined.

I refer to my right honourable friend having expressed the view that the approach to China in the integrated review was no longer the full description. Instead of being a systemic competitor, she recognised it in its true state as a “threat” to the security of this nation. I was very pleased to hear my noble friend the Minister make that important differentiation between the description of the Chinese people and the description of the CCP as it runs the Government of China. It is important that we always all remember that. I hope that whoever succeeds my right honourable friend as leader of the party, and potentially Prime Minister, espouses the same views on China as expressed by Liz Truss.

My friend, the noble Lord, Lord Alton, referred to our visit just two weeks ago to the Gulf—to Bahrain and Qatar—and the fact that we learned there about the joint exercises shortly to be carried out by China, Russia and Iran in the region. It was a real example of “in your face” diplomacy by them. We should always remember that China likes to show what its power really is.

We saw a series of alliances, agreements and co-operation which works very well in that region. I put on record today my thanks to the Governments of Bahrain and Qatar for their hospitality. I also thank our UK ambassadors in Bahrain and Qatar for putting together such a really exhaustive—and exhausting—programme, which enabled us to see so much of the defence co-operation by our allies and friends in that area. I also thank our serving personnel there and those of the United States Air Force, whom we also met.

I mention this in a little more detail than other matters simply because it comes back to the matter of trust. The work we are doing in the Gulf, which is crucial to the security of this country, is possible only because of the way in which so many countries—France, countries across western Europe, the United States and others in the whole of the Middle East region—trust us and work with us to secure what is also our security. Therefore, I reflect very carefully on what the noble Lord, Lord Collins, said, about the importance of Governments remembering that they need to retain international trust if they wish to secure their objectives.

I hope that the objective of our Government continues to be to trade with China, because with its economic heft we need to do so, but to do it in a way that in no way undermines our adherence to the core values that have made this country a great place to live, and to ensure that it remains a great place to live for future generations, who must be watching with some concern today. They need to know that they have a safe future.

Motion agreed.