Huawei and 5G Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateDepartment: Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport
David Davis
Main Page: David Davis (Conservative - Goole and Pocklington)Department Debates - View all David Davis's debates with the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport
(4 years, 8 months ago)
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Sir Iain Duncan Smith
I do not think John Lewis is in the market, but we can check that. I have not been there for any telecommunications.
I say to my colleagues and to you, Mr Paisley, that the situation is an utter mess at the moment.
Mr David Davis (Haltemprice and Howden) (Con)
I have been listening carefully to my right hon. Friend’s brilliant speech. As far as I can see, so far he has knocked down the Government’s arguments on technical grounds, diplomatic grounds, security grounds, practical grounds, commercial grounds and public safety grounds. After listening to his speech, there are no grounds on which to accept Huawei involvement in our national infrastructure. Can it be, therefore, that the Government’s only argument for accepting Huawei’s involvement is fear of China’s economic and geostrategic power? Giving in to that may be expedient, but does my right hon. Friend agree that it would be geostrategically wrong to kowtow to the Chinese Government?
Matt Warman
I fear making no progress at all if I keep giving way.
Put simply, in the view of the most expert telecommunications specialists in the world, as others have said in the debate, a limited amount of carefully controlled hardware from China does not compromise our national security. This Government will continue to do all it can to put the experts who hold that view, both private and public sector, at the disposal of this House. I am grateful to all those hon. Members who have taken up the opportunities for such briefings and I wish they were greater in number. The Government are confident that we are putting the nation’s interests first.
Mr David Davis
I say to the Minister that a mixture of good and bad is not diversity. That is the first thing. He says that he puts the security of the nation first. In pursuit of that, the Government have claimed that there is no back door to Huawei hardware. The Americans assert differently. The Germans agree with them. Other countries agree with them. He served on the Bill Committee for the Investigatory Powers Act 2016. I remind him of sections 252 and 253, which give us the right to have a back door. How can we have a back door, when the hardware installer, the hardware supplier and the hardware administrator does not?
Matt Warman
My right hon. Friend highlights the need for oversight, which I will come on to talk about in a minute.
Telecoms networks are complex. They rely on global supply chains, where some limited measure of vulnerability is inevitable. The critical security question that we have to ask ourselves is how we mitigate such vulnerabilities and stop them damaging the British people and our economy.