High and rising political price of China’s UK investments - Asia Times
"Chinese ownership now extends across many vital sectors.
There’s the Chinese state-owned company Beijing Construction Engineering helping to build a new science and innovation park next to Manchester Airport. And the private Hong Kong company CK Infrastructure, which owns water companies serving northeast England, Essex and Suffolk.
China Investment Corporation (state-owned) owns part of Heathrow, while China Huaneng (state-owned) operates Europe’s largest battery storage facility in Wiltshire. Meanwhile, wind turbine producer Mingyang (privately owned and reputedly linked to the Chinese military) is the preferred bidder for a new Scottish wind farm, despite being barred from a similar Norwegian development.
All of these companies, irrespective of formal ownership, are likely to be subject to varying degrees of CCP influence and control (comment on the issue from Chinese companies is rare).
And successive UK governments have either failed to appreciate the implications of this, or have accepted it as the price of gaining greater access to the Chinese market, especially for London’s financial sector.
This was almost certainly a factor behind China’s involvement in the building of Hinkley Point’s new nuclear power station …"