Residents of Royal Mint Court plan to mount a legal challenge within weeks if Steve Reed, the local government secretary, approves China’s plans to build a vast new embassy at the site by the Tower of London on Tuesday.
Mark Nygate, the treasurer of the local Royal Mint Court Residents’ Association, said people living near the proposed development had concerns about “government interference in what is supposed to be an independent process”.
The group has raised nearly £37,000 out of the £145,000 required to instruct lawyers to seek a judicial review if the decision goes against them. Others, Nygate added, had promised to make further donations if it came to it.
China already owns the freehold of residential properties next to the site, and Nygate and other people living there fear that if the development goes ahead they will one day be kicked out. “We will be looking directly at the 230 flats they want to build for embassy staff and guests; they won’t want us here,” he said.
Campaigners against the development received a legal opinion in September from Lord Banner KC arguing that the Labour government had predetermined the case by approaching it with a “closed mind”.
They would have six weeks to file a challenge to the decision in the high court, which could lead to months or years more of legal argument. But it would also allow for a window of time during which Keir Starmer may be able to make a trip to Beijing, the first time a British prime minister has visited for eight years.
One issue dates back to 2018, when Boris Johnson was foreign secretary. At that time, he sent a letter to the Chinese ambassador, indicating he was happy for Royal Mint Court, acquired by China for £255m, to be formally deemed a diplomatic location even though the embassy had not been built.
It said: “I am pleased to confirm that I have today agreed to grant consent for Royal Mint Court to be designated as diplomatic premises, on the basis of your assurances and the further detail provided by the Chinese ambassador in London.”
However, last week, in 11th-hour correspondence between interested parties before the expected decision on Tuesday, the Foreign Office sought to qualify Johnson’s apparently firm commitment.
Officials said last week that an undisclosed note verbale – a private communication between governments – said: “The consent was conditional on the embassy obtaining any necessary planning permission, and the consent may be withdrawn if this was not obtained.”
Iain Duncan Smith, a co-chair of the Inter Parliamentary Alliance on China (Ipac), wrote on Friday to planning officials handling the case. He said the process was unfair because the source material was not attached – and that Johnson’s comments appeared to suggest to China the development was certain to be approved.
Though Ipac had previously obtained a leaked copy of the Johnson letter, the contents of the note verbale are unknown. “Without the text of the note verbale, it is impossible to determine which instruments of domestic and international law it seeks to engage,” the Conservative MP wrote.
Duncan Smith also argued that it was “highly irregular” for an informal side note to have more weight than a signed letter from a government minister. Johnson’s letter appeared to amount to “a binding international commitment” that would mean the planning issue had already been prejudged.
China’s original planning application was rejected by the local Tower Hamlets council in 2022, then resubmitted in 2024 and called in by Reed’s predecessor Angela Rayner in October of that year.
Campaigners against the embassy also highlight comments made by Starmer to China’s president, Xi Jinping, at the G20 summit in November 2024. At the time, the prime minister said: “You raised the Chinese embassy building in London when we spoke on the telephone. We have since taken action by calling in that application.”
Critics have also raised concerns about the potential spying risk from the new site, which is located near high-speed data cables. But MI5 has indicated that it does not consider the risks posed as greater than normal. Some officials have argued that consolidating China’s existing seven sites into one has advantages for the host country.
