UK ‘more robust’ with China than allies, says Sunak

The UK’s approach to dealing with China is “more robust” than most of its allies, Rishi Sunak has said.

The Prime Minister’s remark came after he was challenged by MPs on the liaison committee over the Government’s response to a Chinese state-backed hacking operation.

He told the committee, which is made up of select committee chairmen, that China’s cyber-hacking was behaviour that the UK and its allies “won’t stand for”.

Mr Sunak rejected the suggestion from Liam Byrne, the Labour MP and chairman of the Commons business and trade committee, that while other nations acted to protect themselves against China, the UK was merely “thinking about it”.

Responding to the challenge, Mr Sunak said: “Our approach to China is undoubtedly more robust than, I’d say, most of our allies.”

He pointed to European countries not removing Huawei equipment from their telecommunications networks, not placing similar restrictions on exports of sensitive technology to China and said the UK’s foreign investment regime was the most recently implemented and therefore the most robust, among other examples.

Mr Sunak said: “The first thing to say is China represents the greatest state-based threat to our economic security and … we have seen behaviour that we just won’t stand for.

“Their actions in relation to our and our allies’ democracies are deeply concerning, which is why recently we have taken a retaliatory action and we will continue to address their behaviour with tough action. Where we identify risks and threats the track record is clear that we will take action.”

It was suggested to Mr Sunak that the UK had talked tough on China but had not taken any significant action.

The Prime Minister said: “I am entirely confident that our approach to dealing with the risk that China poses is very much in line with our allies and in most cases goes further in protecting ourselves.”

Mr Byrne, who has raised concerns about the influence of Chinese-owned businesses such as Bytedance, said in response that it “clearly doesn’t”.

The Prime Minister’s defence of the UK’s China policy comes after the Government blamed Beijing for “malicious” cyber attacks on parliamentarians and the Electoral Commission, sanctioning some of those involved.

Cabinet tensions have reportedly surfaced over the issue, with some ministers pushing for tougher action on Beijing while others are resistant over concerns it could harm economic and trade relations.

On Tuesday, the charge d’affaires at the Chinese embassy attended the Foreign Office following a formal summons to account for his country’s actions.

The Foreign Office said it had set out an “unequivocal condemnation” of “malicious cyber activity” by organisations affiliated to Beijing, saying it “would not tolerate such threatening activity, and would continue to take strong action with partners across the globe to respond”.

Backbench Conservatives criticised the Government’s actions, saying it had not gone far enough, while others renewed their calls for China to be labelled a “threat”.

Gillian Keegan, the Education Secretary, told Times Radio on Tuesday morning that China was “obviously a security threat” but Downing Street has been keen to play down the possibility that the Government could change its language on the country, which it currently calls an “epoch-defining challenge”.

Sir Iain Duncan Smith suggested that Chinese products should be labelled on Amazon so customers concerned about human rights issues can avoid buying them.

The former Tory leader said many people want to buy less from China but struggle to do so when shopping online because they don’t know where the item comes from until it’s “too late”.

He called on the Government to “do more” to tackle the issue as pressure mounts on Mr Sunak to toughen his stance on Beijing after MPs branded his cyber attack sanctions “feeble” and “pathetic”.