Luke de Pulford, the executive director of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China, told The Times: \u201cIt shouldn\u2019t be forgotten that the government initially denied that the cables existed, and sought to discredit the journalists working to expose the story. <\/p>\n
\u201cThis has been a case study in government obfuscation over an issue of crucial importance, which does not just impact the UK\u2019s own national security but that of our closest allies.\u201d<\/p>\n
Iain Duncan Smith criticised the government for \u201clying about the nature of the communications cabling\u201d<\/p>\n
The Sunday Times previously revealed that the White House had warned Downing Street against allowing the plans to go ahead.<\/p>\n
The White House was \u201cdeeply concerned\u201d by the plan to approve the embassy, the Daily Telegraph reported on Tuesday evening, with a senior administration official telling the newspaper it feared \u201cadversaries exploiting the critical infrastructure of our closest allies\u201d.<\/p>\n
John Moolenaar, the chairman of the US House of Representatives\u2019 select committee on China, said: \u201cThe CCP is a threat to the UK, a Five Eyes intelligence partner, and free people everywhere.\u201c<\/p>\n
It is understood that there are concerns about cybersecurity and whether financial or infrastructure data could be accessed. However officials have accepted that there is a \u201cpolitical reality\u201d that the embassy will go ahead.<\/p>\n
The deadline for a decision is January 20<\/a>. On Tuesday some of Starmer\u2019s own MPs warned him against approving the plans. <\/p>\n Sarah Champion, the Labour MP for Rotherham who chairs the Commons international development committee, said: \u201cMultiple government agencies and government departments have raised concerns about this mega-embassy.<\/p>\n Protesters outside the Royal Mint site in February 2025<\/p>\n JACK TAYLOR FOR THE SUNDAY TIMES<\/p>\n \u201cOur international partners have raised concerns about it. Every security briefing I\u2019ve had identifies China as a hostile state to the UK<\/a>. I am in no doubt this mega-embassy should not be allowed to go ahead.\u201d<\/p>\n \u2022 Starmer must broach human rights abuses and spying on China visit<\/a><\/p>\n Alex Sobel, the Labour MP for Leeds Central & Headingley, added: \u201cThe Chinese state undertakes considerable transnational repression against the Chinese diaspora in the United Kingdom, much of it co-ordinated out of the existing Chinese embassy. <\/p>\n \u201cThe new super-embassy is a real threat to Hongkongers, Uighurs and other members of the Chinese diaspora who do not toe the Beijing party line.\u201d<\/p>\n Others including Emily Darlington, the MP for Milton Keynes Central, James Naish, the MP for Rushcliffe, and Mark Sewards, the MP for Leeds South West & Morley, wrote to Steve Reed, the environment and housing secretary who is expected to announce the decision, urging the government not to approve the embassy. <\/p>\n Alex Sobel MP said the embassy poses a \u201creal threat\u201d<\/p>\n HOUSE OF COMMONS<\/p>\n Downing Street believes that consolidating China<\/a>\u2019s diplomatic premises on to a single site has security advantages.<\/p>\n However, Alicia Kearns, the shadow home office minister, said: \u201cWe know now that they plan to demolish the wall between the cables and their embassy. Cables on which our economy is dependent. Cables carrying millions of British people\u2019s emails and financial data, and access that would give the Chinese Communist Party a launchpad for economic warfare against our nation.\u201d<\/p>\n Plans for the site include 208 secret rooms and a hidden chamber, and Kearns said: \u201cThe government can claim today that they had no idea about these secret rooms, and we will take them at that word. But they cannot now say they have no power to protect us.<\/p>\n \u201cProtect our economy, protect the British people, deny the Chinese Communist Party<\/a> their embassy.\u201d<\/p>\n Matthew Pennycook, the planning minister, said it would be inappropriate for him to comment on a live case.<\/p>\n He said: \u201cThe government does not provide a running commentary on planning casework decisions \u2026 and it would be particularly inappropriate to make any comment on material which has been received.\u201d<\/p>\n He added: \u201cMinisters will take all material planning considerations into account when the final decision is made, and ministers will inform the House of the decision accordingly.\u201d<\/p>\n The government said: \u201cNational security is the first duty of this government and has been the core priority throughout this process. That is why the Home Office and Foreign Office worked closely across government, with policing, and other relevant partners, to ensure that any potential national security issues associated with this planning application have been considered and addressed<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n The Chinese embassy in London was contacted for comment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Britain has been forced to reassure the United States and other intelligence partners that no sensitive government data…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":368601,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[59,57,58,50,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-368600","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-kingdom","tag-gb","tag-great-britain","tag-greatbritain","tag-news","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/368600","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=368600"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/368600\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/368601"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=368600"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=368600"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=368600"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Protesters](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/\/4a55cb99-5b84-4e5e-a449-9b04f7222bc5.jpg\")
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