Johnson survives Tory rebellion over Huawei UK 5G role

BORIS Johnson has survived the first Conservative rebellion of the new Parliament over the involvement of Chinese telecoms firm Huawei in the UK’s 5G network.

Conservative critics led by former party leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith tabled an amendment seeking to ban “high-risk vendors” from the system after 2022.

Despite 38 Tories rebelling, ministers won with a majority of 24 yesterday after moving to head off a revolt over fears Huawei is a risk to UK security.

The Prime Minister was able to fend off the revolt from within his own party thanks to the 80-strong majority won at the December general election.

Critics are concerned that his decision to allow Huawei to supply “non-core” elements of the 5G network could jeopardise security because of the firm’s ties to the Chinese state.

The White House has banned the firm from US telecoms networks and has been highly critical of the government’s decision, which came despite intense lobbying from the States.

Sir Iain had warned MPs that the rebels were “genuinely concerned” about the involvement of the firm he described as being “essentially almost completely owned” by Chinese trade unions controlled by the state.

“The reality is when it comes to security versus cost, my view is security wins every single time because I worry when we start compromising security,” he added.

Conservative former trade secretary Liam Fox urged the UK to “avoid the risk” by not using Huawei rather than seeking to mitigate it.

“In order to achieve greater trade with China, we do not need to sacrifice our national security by including Huawei as part of that risk,” he added to the Commons.

Ahead of the vote defeated by 282 votes to 306, Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden wrote to Tory MPs setting out the measures the government was taking to restrict Huawei’s involvement.

“I wish to stress again that the Government is clear-eyed about the challenges posed by Huawei,” Mr Dowden wrote.

“That is why the National Security Council made a decision to: exclude them from the security critical network functions in 5G networks, and reduce their presence in other network functions up to a strict market share cap of 35%.

“This position is based on the comprehensive security advice provided by the cyber security branch of GCHQ, the National Cyber Security Centre.”

Huawei hit back, with vice-president Victor Zhang saying: “An evidence-based approach is needed, so we were disappointed to hear groundless accusations asserted.”