The decision to limit what key witness Matthew Collins could say in the spy trial came from the “the very top”
Early last month, a meeting of senior Whitehall mandarins, including Jonathan Powell (left pic), national security adviser, and Sir Oliver Robbins, the permanent secretary at the Foreign Office, met to discuss the trial. Powell revealed that the government’s star witness would be basing his evidence on a recently published official report: The National Security Strategy 2025, which stops well short of referring to China as an “enemy” state, characterizing it as a “challenge” instead.
This meant Matthew Collins, the deputy national security adviser due to give evidence for the prosecution, would be unable to defend the notion that China was an enemy or overtly hostile to UK interests. It appears that, in the circumstances, the trial was doomed: the Official Secrets Act specifically requires prosecutors to show a defendant acted for an enemy.
Powell, who held talks with Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Beijing in July, is one of Sir Keir Starmer’s closest advisers and a direct political appointment. It is not clear who made the decision to limit what Collins could say. However, witnesses were told by investigating police officers that it came from the “the very top”.
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In April last year, the CPS said that a “senior member of the CCP and a politburo member” — reportedly Cai Qi (蔡奇) — had received “politically sensitive information” from Chris Cash — who was a researcher at the China Research Group chaired by Tory MP Alicia Kearns — and Christopher Berry.
This was deemed “prejudicial to the safety or interests of the UK” because the information they passed on was “directly or indirectly useful to the Chinese state”. Among the material passed to Cai is understood to have been details of a foreign affairs committee delegation to Taiwan in Nov 2022.
This is thought to have included information about the hotel and even the room numbers of where the MPs, including Kearns, were staying. Cai, a Xi protégé, is the fifth-ranking member of the seven-man politburo and a director of the CCP’s general office, making him de facto chief of staff to Xi.
The trial of Cash and Berry had been due to start at Woolwich crown court on Oct 6. Senior figures in the security services and police were confident that the case was a “slam dunk” and they had met the evidence threshold required. In early Sep, police from the Metropolitan Police’s SO15 unit, which handles spy as well as terrorism cases, had even called Kearns, one of the key witnesses, to arrange a familiarization visit to the court.
On Sep 15, however, the charges against the pair were dropped.
Stephen Parkinson, the director of public prosecutions (DPP), blamed an “evidential failure” for the decision. The CPS has declined to give details on why the case collapsed, including whether any witnesses in the government had given evidence that would have undermined the categorization of China as an “enemy”.
It has also failed to explain why the CPS said there had been “sufficient evidence” to prosecute Cash and Berry when they were charged in Apr 2024 but not in Sep 2025. It has been suggested by one well-placed source that the bar the CPS needed to reach was raised — although this has never been stated formally despite the intense scrutiny around the case. However, another source familiar with the case said the case collapsed because of the “availability or capability of the witnesses to provide the evidence needed to allow it to proceed”.
In a letter last week to Chris Philp, the shadow home secretary, all Parkinson would say is that the “threat categorisation of China or other countries are not matters for the CPS to comment on”.
Early last month, Powell, the national security adviser, convened a top secret meeting of mandarins from across the government. He used the gathering to discuss the potential diplomatic and
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https://thetimes.com/uk/politics/article/how-chinese-spy-case-collapsed-5p5txh6h3…
The decision to limit what key witness Matthew Collins could say in the spy trial came from the “the very top” 
national security adviser, and Sir Oliver Robbins, the permanent secretary at the Foreign Office, met to discuss the trial. Powell revealed that the government’s star witness would be basing his evidence on a recently published official report: The National Security Strategy 2025, which stops well short of referring to China as an “enemy” state, characterizing it as a “challenge” instead.
This meant Matthew Collins, the deputy national security adviser due to give evidence for the prosecution, would be unable to defend the notion that China was an enemy or overtly hostile to UK interests. It appears that, in the circumstances, the trial was doomed: the Official Secrets Act specifically requires prosecutors to show a defendant acted for an enemy.
Powell, who held talks with 
Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Beijing in July, is one of Sir Keir Starmer’s closest advisers and a direct political appointment. It is not clear who made the decision to limit what Collins could say. However, witnesses were told by investigating police officers that it came from the “the very top”.
==========
In April last year, the CPS said that a “senior member of the CCP and a politburo member” — reportedly 