China spy row Case collapsed over lack of 'critical element', says DPP

Government evidence in the China espionage trial was missing a “critical element”, which meant there was “no other option” but to drop the case, prosecutors said yesterday.

- Eleni Courea

Stephen Parkinson, the director of public prosecutions, did not directly blame anyone for the collapse of the trial but said that the government's refusal to describe China as a national security threat meant “all routes were closed”.

Matthew Collins, the senior civil servant who drafted the government’s evidence, said he could not meet prosecutors’ demands because the Conservative government at that time “did not go so far as to label China a threat in the generic sense”.

He insisted the three statements he did provide detailed the “range of threats” that China posed to the UK’s economy, cyber infrastructure and democratic institutions, and that he was “surprised” and “disappointed” that the case had collapsed.

Parkinson and Collins were among the senior figures giving evidence to a joint committee on the national security strategy amid the extraordinary fallout over the decision to pull charges against two British men accused of spying for China.

Christopher Cash, a former parliamentary researcher, and Christopher Berry, an academic, both denied the espionage charges brought against them under the Official Secrets Act.