Boris staves off first party rebellion on Huawei’s role in British 5G network

PRIME Minister Boris Johnson yesterday defeated his first party rebellion over a government decision to allow China’s Huawei to have a role in building Britain’s 5G mobile phone network.

Huawei, the world’s biggest producer of telecoms equipment, has been caught in a stand-off between Washington and Beijing, after the US accused it of spying on Western secrets, allegations the company denied.

Britain decided in January to allow Huawei into what the government said were non-sensitive parts of the country’s 5G network, capping its involvement at 35%.

This angered the US, which wants to exclude Huawei from the West’s next-generation communications systems, and has urged Britain to rethink.

Some senior Conservatives shared the US unhappiness. They wanted Huawei eliminated entirely from Britain’s 5G networks by the end of December 2022.

The government tried to placate the rebels by saying it would work towards increasing the supply of 5G telecoms gear so operators would not need to use Huawei, but it refused to commit to any timetable to ban the Chinese company. However, the rebels pushed their plan to a vote.

The government, which has an 80 seat majority, won by 24.

Digital Infrastructure Minister Matt Warman said the government had “heard loud and clear the points made on all sides of the house”.

Bob Seely, one of the rebels, signalled that the group would continue to pursue their cause, describing the vote as “a strong first showing”.

The rebels wanted to amend the Telecommunications Infrastructure Bill to ensure that companies termed by British security experts as “high-risk vendors” – such as Huawei – were stripped out of networks by the end of 2022. The government said it did not want high-risk vendors, but in a market dominated by three players – Huawei, Sweden’s Ericsson and Finland’s Nokia – some network operators were relying on Huawei.

“We would like to get to the point where we won’t need to have any high-risk vendors at all,” Digital Minister Oliver Dowden told parliament.

Huawei vice-president Victor Zhang said the company had been “reassured” by the government’s decision, which would “result in a more advanced, more secure and more cost-effective telecoms infrastructure”.