From Beijing to Brussels: Starmer’s surrender strategy is shrinking Britain on the world stage, writes Priti Patel

The Prime Minister is on the brink. He is at war with his own party, pouring all his resources into keeping himself in office. At a time when our country faces serious challenges, Britain is not being governed.

It all projects a sorry image of abject weakness to our friends and our foes on the international stage, at precisely the time when Britain must be strong in the world.

The world as we have known it for most of our lives is over. An axis of authoritarian regimes stands against us on an aggressive quest for global governance. Their focus is to undermine our whole way of life, democracy, liberty, sovereignty, and the rule of law.

It has made the world more unpredictable and dangerous than at any point for decades.

My Party is clear on Britain’s place in the world and where we stand when it comes to fighting for our values and principles.

We are developing a serious plan to advance Britain’s interests. The contrast with Labour could not be clearer.

From day one of this Labour government they have shown weakness. Just look at how Keir Starmer has sought to cosy up to China. In a desperate attempt to appease Beijing, Labour collapsed the case against two alleged Chinese spies operating at the heart of our democracy.

Just last month they approved plans for a Chinese spy-hub super embassy in Central London despite the many concerns raised about the serious implications for national security.

Shortly afterwards, Starmer jetted off to Beijing on a Surrender Tour, going cap-in-hand to Xi Jinping hoping to win some crumbs of investment to paper over the gaping holes in our economy.

He came back with next to nothing.

And no sooner had he returned than British Hong Konger dissident Jimmy Lai was sentenced to two decades in prison. The timing looked calculated to remind Starmer of the contempt in which the Chinese Community Party holds him.

And of course, Starmer is still trying to force through his Chagos-China Surrender. He wants to hand British sovereign territory and £35 billion of hard-pressed taxpayers’ money to an ally of China.

We do not know when the Surrender Bill will return to Parliament. Labour pulled it in a panic after the Conservatives pointed out that it could breach international law. But they have invested so much political capital in this disastrous deal that they are ploughing ahead anyway at any cost.

That’s despite the fact it has Peter Mandelson’s fingers all over it. And those of Jonathan Powell, the former aide to Tony Blair with well-known links to China who now serves as Starmer’s National Security Advisor. It has been reported that Mandelson convinced Starmer to bring Powell back into Government, and he reciprocated by pushing for Mandelson to get the US Ambassador job.

Reports this week suggested Starmer wobbled and considered abandoning the Chagos Surrender, only for Powell and the Attorney General Lord Hermer to convince him to stick with it.

It seems he is entirely reliant on his advisers, which is a bit of a problem when those advisers are clearly complete duds who have no idea what they are doing.

It is not just in relation to China, however, that Starmer is weak. In recent weeks his Government having been rolling the pitch for another surrender – this time to the EU.

Starmer was the architect of Labour’s botched plan for a rigged second referendum and he has never got over what happened in 2016.

Now, desperate for someone or something to blame for their disastrous consequences of their economic incompetence, Labour are trying to pin the blame on Brexit.

Already, they have handed over fishing rights to the EU in order to access an EU defence fund that has delivered not a penny in return. Instead of begging the EU to let us sign up, Starmer should follow the Conservatives’ lead of creating a 100% British Sovereign Defence Fund, backing British firms.

And now Cabinet Ministers are openly calling for Britain to join an EU customs union or even the Single Market.

Neither of these things is compatibly with maintaining British sovereignty. A customs union would give control of trade policy to Brussels, while Single Market membership would hand control of our borders to European bureaucrats.

Briefings are emerging of a ‘Brexit Reset’ Bill, and although details have not yet been produced, it’s obvious that it will represent yet another Surrender from our weak Prime Minister.

We have forced Labour to effectively admit that any such deal will come with ‘poison pill’ termination clauses. These terms will make it incredibly expensive to reverse whatever deal Labour agree to.

Rather than reopen these old wounds, Starmer should be focusing on tackling the real challenges facing our economy – things like the soaring welfare bill his Government is responsible for.

This weekend I am at the Munich Security Conference talking to our allies about the importance of NATO, the challenges we face on the international stage and how we can defend our shared values of freedom and democracy in a changing world.

And looking at how we can reinforce our support for Ukraine at this critical moment.

We all know that the war chest Putin is using to fund his illegal invasion is being sustained in no small part by oil export revenues. And crucially, we know the refineries that process and re-export Russian crude.

Coordinated pressure by Britain and our allies on these refineries clearly needs to happen, so that they diversify away from Russian oil. The cost to Putin would be huge.

I am urging the government to demonstrate British leadership and take up the mantle of building an international coalition behind this plan.

Conservatives remain ruthlessly focussed on how we can out-manoeuvre our adversaries with serious foreign and defence policy.

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Dame Priti Patel is the is the Shadow Foreign Secretary and Conservative MP for Witham

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