Most people in Britain see China’s rise as a top threat to security in next decade, survey finds

China is also the second least trusted nation after Russia among Britons, according to annual poll by British think tank
Just 22 per cent of respondents said they supported London pursuing economic ties with Beijing, while only 8 per cent backed tilt to Indo-Pacific

China trade

Matt Ho

Published: 5:12pm, 18 Feb 2021

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China is second to Russia on the list of nations that Britons least trust to act responsibly in global affairs, and more now see its rise as a “critical threat”, according to a new survey by a British think tank.

Just 22 per cent of respondents supported London to pursue economic relations with Beijing, and approval was even lower, at 13 per cent, for Chinese involvement in building infrastructure in Britain like energy and telecoms projects.

Meanwhile, support for the British government’s tilt towards the Indo-Pacific was lukewarm at best, with most respondents, or 37 per cent, saying they were undecided and only 8 per cent agreeing the region should be at the centre of British foreign policy.

The annual survey by the British Foreign Policy Group was conducted on January 6 and 7, with 2,002 respondents, and comes as London is recalibrating its relations with Beijing and reorientating its overall foreign policy to a “Global Britain” in the post-Brexit era.

Relations between Britain and China have been strained in the past two years over Hong Kong, London’s decision to ban Huawei Technologies from the country’s 5G network, and Beijing’s treatment of the Muslim ethnic minority in Xinjiang. Last week China took the BBC off the air, days after its state broadcaster CGTN had its licence revoked in Britain.

“Obviously, we have this very electric political conversation about China, particularly in the past 18 months, with the Huawei decision, and of course the origin of coronavirus pandemic … and the British people have been watching all of these, and they are concerned,” Sophia Gaston, the think tank’s director and lead author of the report, told British radio station LBC on Wednesday.

“We are seeing attitudes hardening at a really rapid pace,” she said.

How Britain’s CGTN ban shows Western insecurity over China’s rise

Some 79 per cent of respondents saw “the rise of China as a world power” as a top potential threat to Britain’s security in the next decade, after foreign cyberattacks and international terrorism but before climate change, according to the report.

Among them, the proportion who saw China’s rise as a “critical threat” jumped by 11 percentage points from last year to 41 per cent.

Russia and China were the top two countries Britons most distrusted in global affairs, with 78 per cent of those surveyed saying they did not believe Beijing would act responsibly in the world, just behind 80 per cent for Moscow. The researchers concluded that the coronavirus pandemic had done considerable damage to public opinion on China.

In contrast, opinions on two of China’s neighbours, Japan and India, were more favourable – 67 per cent of respondents said they trusted Japan, up from 59 per cent last year, while those who trusted India increased from 40 to 51 per cent.

Canada was the most trusted nation, with backing from 88 per cent of respondents, followed by Australia at 83 per cent.

According to the survey, British people favoured “a pragmatic but value-led relationship” with China.

It found 40 per cent of respondents believed Britain should challenge China’s human rights record, while 38 per cent at the same time agreed London should cooperate with Beijing on shared global challenges such as climate change.

The Royal Navy is sending a strike group led by the HMS Queen Elizabeth to the Pacific later this year. Photo: AFP

Security is another area of friction between the two countries, with Britain to send a strike group led by its new aircraft carrier, the HMS Queen Elizabeth, to the Pacific later this year – a move that has drawn criticism from Beijing.

However, the survey found only 18 per cent of Britons were comfortable with the deployment of security resources to contain China in the Indo-Pacific, while 35 per cent thought Britain’s involvement in the region should be balanced with investments elsewhere.

The report concluded that “this lack of salience reflects a deeper instinct that questions the UK’s direct stake in the Indo-Pacific region”.