A business associate of an alleged Chinese spy is a major Tory donor who was handed key roles at Government departments, including the Ministry of Defence by the last Conservative government.
Former racing tycoon Sir Ron Dennis is the sole director of an investment firm he jointly owns with Yang Tengbo. Yang is the alleged spy barred from the UK on national security grounds after becoming a close confidant of Prince Andrew. He insists the allegations against him are “entirely untrue”.
50-year-old Yang became co-owner with Sir Ron in May 2017 of Coeus International Limited, a fund management firm founded by Dennis two years earlier. This was shortly after Dennis became Co-Chair of the Defence Innovation Advisory Panel for the Ministry of Defence. This panel was set up to “challenge” the MoD on how it is adapting to the changing threats, including cyber, from countries like China.
Rheian Davies, Good Law Project’s legal director, said: “The proximity of this alleged spy to a Tory government insider who likely had access to sensitive information, is a case in point of how the rich and powerful in our country may leave themselves and our political system exposed to potentially malign influence to the detriment of us all.”
Dennis went on to be appointed non-executive director of the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology for a year from 2023 to 2024. He was in this role when the Intelligence and Security Committee published a bombshell report on China, which found the Far East state “targets the UK and its interests prolifically and aggressively”.
The Department has a key role in protecting British research interests and advising UK academics on joint projects with other countries including China. There is no suggestion of any wrongdoing by Dennis or Coeus International. Dennis declared his directorship of Coeus International to the Department of Science, Innovation and Technology. He was not available for comment.
Yang came to the UK in 2002 to study and founded his first business here in 2005. He was granted indefinite leave to remain in the UK in 2013. He started a number of businesses, including consultancy firm Hampton Group International, and split his time between the UK and China.
Yang said Hampton helped British firms gain a foothold in China. One client was McLaren, run at the time by Dennis. But in November 2021, Yang was stopped at the UK border and surrendered his digital devices, which were later returned. In 2023, then Home Secretary Suella Braverman excluded him from the UK.
Sir Ron Dennis is best known for nearly four decades at the helm of McLaren, the car and racing brand, where he ran their Formula One team. He was forced out after he backed a Chinese takeover of McLaren in 2016. He was a British Business Ambassador for the UK between 2010 and 2019 and was knighted last year. Dennis has donated £579,000 to the Conservatives since 2005, including £250,000 in May.
In a statement issued after the High Court agreed to his request for him to be named, Yang Tengbo said: “I have done nothing wrong or unlawful and the concerns raised by the Home Office against me are ill-founded. The widespread description of me as a ‘spy’ is entirely untrue. I have dedicated my professional life in the UK to building links between British and Chinese businesses. My activities have played a part in bringing hundreds of millions of pounds of investment into the UK.”
A Conservative party spokesman said: "All reportable donations are properly and transparently declared to the Electoral Commission, published by them, and comply fully with the law." Sir Ron Dennis was not available for comment.