UK PM Starmer under fire as top clients of Mandelson's firm linked to Chinese military

New concerns have emerged over Keir Starmer's backing for Lord Mandelson after reports emerged that the largest client of his lobbying firm had alleged links to the Chinese military. Leaked documents revealed that Global Counsel, founded by a peer and former New Labour minister, made over 3.5 million pounds in 2024 and 2025 from WuXi AppTec.

The Shanghai-listed biotech company had been the target of a bill introduced to Congress in 2024 that sought to bar it from securing government contracts on national security grounds. However, the bill was never enacted, and a diluted version was eventually passed last year by Donald Trump, which did not name any specific firms.

A report by UK China Transparency (UKCT) stated that the firm represented Canyon Bridge in 2020, when it attempted to overhaul the board of a UK microchip company it had acquired three years earlier. Canyon Bridge had been permitted to purchase Imagination Technologies for 550 million pounds in 2017, despite concerns that its ultimate owner, China Reform, was controlled by Beijing.

A bipartisan group of US lawmakers initiated a probe that same year into the firm’s “concerning ties” to the Chinese military. Separately, Global Counsel, which shut down earlier this year amid renewed scrutiny of Mandelson’s past links to Jeffrey Epstein, has also been accused of lobbying UK ministers on behalf of a private equity firm that was later blacklisted in the United States.

Canyon Bridge vs Lattice Semiconductor

Days after the handover, the US government barred Canyon Bridge from buying American chipmaker Lattice Semiconductor on national security grounds. At the time, Mandelson was involved with GC, and later he resigned from the board in 2024. Following the resignation, he sold his final shares in the firm after he became embroiled in the Epstein scandal, tried unsuccessfully to distance himself from his actions and prevent clients from leaving.

Tory MP Iain Duncan Smith, the co-chairman of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China (IPAC), stated that the Mail Global Council had been guiding and assisiting firm who could be seen as threats to UK business and to the defence of the nation. "We have known about this ever since he came in; we were complaining about all that we knew about the people he was working with, and it was just poo-pooed as though it was irrelevant," he said. "He (Keir Starmer) must have known about Global Counsel, I cannot think that nobody told him that Mandelson has deep links through Global Counsel to Chinese companies, very exposed to the (Chinese) government," he added.

Meanwhile, WuXi safeguarded its business activities when targeted in 2024. In an 'open letter to our customers', it said: "WuXi AppTec does not pose a national security risk to any country. While the US government has determined that certain companies do pose such a risk to the United States and has imposed sanctions against them, WuXi AppTec has never been subject to any such determination or sanction. We welcome regulatory oversight of our industry, including the proposed evaluation of biotech companies in the recent legislation. 'But we strongly object to blanket allegations and preemptive actions against our company without due process."

In 2024, Global Counsel told UK China Transparency that it had assisted Canyon Bridge in shaping a strategy to reassure UK stakeholders, while maintaining that it had not worked for China Reform.