On December 3, 2025, a parliamentary inquiry delivered a scathing verdict on the collapse of one of the United Kingdom’s most high-profile espionage prosecutions in recent memory. The case, which accused former parliamentary researcher Christopher Cash and academic Christopher Berry of passing sensitive information to Chinese intelligence between 2021 and 2023, fell apart in September—setting off a storm of political finger-pointing, public confusion, and renewed scrutiny of the UK’s national security apparatus.
According to the report by the Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy (JCNSS), the failure was not the result of a shadowy conspiracy or deliberate sabotage, but rather a cascade of “systemic failures” in communication, coordination, and decision-making between the government and the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS). The committee’s findings, echoed across outlets including BBC, Sky News, and The Independent, warned that unless sweeping reforms are enacted, similar debacles could play out again—undermining public trust and potentially endangering national security.
The case began with dramatic headlines. Cash and Berry, both of whom deny any wrongdoing, were charged under the Official Secrets Act in April 2024. Cash, notably, had worked for MPs Tom Tugendhat and Alicia Kearns—both prominent critics of China. The accusations, alleging the pair had passed secrets to Beijing, were explosive enough to spark concern at the highest levels of government. Yet, by September 2025, the charges were abruptly dropped. The CPS said it could not secure the evidence necessary to proceed, specifically government confirmation that China constituted a national security threat at the relevant time.
This evidential gap proved fatal. Central to the prosecution’s collapse was Deputy National Security Adviser Matt Collins, who, as the committee noted, refused to describe Beijing as a “threat” to UK national security in his witness statements. Collins later explained to the JCNSS that he had provided evidence of a “range of threats” posed by China, but had not labeled the country as a generic threat because that was not the official position of the Conservative government at the time. The committee acknowledged the CPS’s concern that putting Collins on the stand without such a designation could have undermined the entire case. Yet, they also suggested that “common sense interpretations” of his statements should have been sufficient to meet evidential requirements, lamenting, “We regret that common sense interpretations of the wording provided in the DNSA’s witness statements were apparently not a sufficiently strong basis for meeting the evidential requirements the Crown Prosecution Service considered necessary under the Official Secrets Act 1911.”
As the dust settled, accusations of a “cover-up” swirled, with some critics alleging that the government had deliberately allowed the case to fail to avoid damaging trade relations with China. However, the JCNSS report found no evidence of a coordinated effort to obstruct the prosecution. “We did not find evidence of a coordinated high-level effort to bring about the collapse of the prosecution,” the committee stated. “Nor did we find evidence of deliberate efforts to obstruct the prosecution, circumvent constitutional safeguards or frustrate our inquiry.” Even a meeting between National Security Adviser Jonathan Powell and officials, held just two days before the CPS dropped the charges, was found to have discussed only “a range of scenarios” and not the specifics of the evidence.
Instead, the committee’s investigation painted a picture of “shambolic” mismanagement. Communications between the CPS and government were described as “inadequate,” with a “pervasive lack of clarity” about the nature of requests and evidential requirements. An unexplained eight-month delay in obtaining a crucial second witness statement further exacerbated the confusion. The CPS, for its part, was criticized for failing to escalate or clarify issues over misaligned expectations much earlier in the process. The government team, meanwhile, was faulted for not having clear processes for escalating issues where clarity was lacking.
The root of the problem, many officials argued, lay in the outdated Official Secrets Act 1911, which required the term “enemy” to be used in prosecutions—a term that the government was reluctant to apply to China. Attorney General Richard Hermer described the law as “not fit for purpose.” The new National Security Act 2023, which replaced the term “enemy” with “foreign power” and broadened the scope to include modern threats like cyber attacks, was intended to address these shortcomings. But the JCNSS warned that the new legislation does not eliminate “diplomatic sensitivities” around labeling individuals as members of a foreign intelligence service, and similar evidential pitfalls could easily emerge. “We urge the government to avoid characterising the failure of the Cash/Berry case as a one-off peculiarity created solely by outdated legislation: there are structural parallels in the National Security Act 2023 which will require careful handling to avoid comparable issues recurring,” the committee cautioned.
To prevent a repeat, the JCNSS made a series of recommendations. Within six months, the Cabinet Office and security services should work with the CPS to formalize principles for handling sensitive national security prosecutions. Every espionage case, they argued, should convene a formal case conference within 30 days of charges, bringing together prosecutors, investigators, government witnesses, and law officers to identify and address evidential weaknesses early. The committee also called for an urgent review of the role and responsibilities of the Deputy National Security Adviser, who they said had been left “isolated and exposed.”
The government and CPS responded swiftly to the report. A CPS spokesperson told The Independent, “We recognise the strong interest in this case. We will review the recommendations carefully and work with partners to identify where improvements can be made. Our decisions are made independently and based on law and evidence, and that principle remains at the heart of our work.” A government spokesperson echoed that sentiment, stating, “We welcome the committee’s report that makes clear that allegations about interference in this case were baseless and untrue. The decision to drop the case was taken independently by the Crown Prosecution Service. We remain disappointed that this case did not reach trial. Protecting national security is our first duty and we will never waver from our efforts to keep the British people safe.”
For all the official statements, though, the episode has left lingering questions about the resilience of the UK’s legal and security frameworks in an era of intensifying global competition. As committee chair Matt Western put it, “As the global security environment worsens, sensitive national security cases will arise more frequently. The government must show the public that it is confident in standing up to adversaries when required: failing to do so will corrode public trust in our institutions.” The message is clear: the stakes are high, and the margin for error is shrinking.
With reforms now on the table and scrutiny at an all-time high, the government faces a pivotal moment in its approach to espionage and national security. Whether the lessons from the Cash and Berry case will be learned—or repeated—remains to be seen.
