Queen Elizabeth’s funeral: Commons speaker accused of betrayal after deputy to Xi visits coffin

China’s vice-president was allowed to view the Queen’s lying-in-state yesterday, despite a parliamentary ban on the country’s diplomats.

Chinese Vice President Wang Qishan was allowed to view the Queen’s coffin despite a diplomatic ban.

China’s vice-president was allowed to view the Queen’s lying-in-state yesterday, despite a parliamentary ban on the country’s diplomats.

Wang Qishan is due to attend the state funeral of Queen Elizabeth today on behalf of President Xi.

Sir Lindsay Hoyle, the Commons Speaker, promised MPs that he would retain a ban on Chinese officials from visiting the Palace of Westminster. It was introduced in response to the Chinese government sanctioning several MPs for criticising Beijing’s abuse of Uighur Muslims.

However, it emerged yesterday that the ban applied only to the Chinese ambassador and accredited diplomats and did not extend to heads of state. As Wang is attending on behalf of Xi, the head of state, he was allowed in to Westminster Hall.

Hoyle was forced to defend himself against accusations he had buckled to pressure from the “Establishment” to allow the vice-president and his delegation in, to avoid a diplomatic incident from overshadowing the funeral.

Asked by Laura Kuenssberg on the BBC yesterday whether he had been “leant” on, Hoyle said: “Nobody has been leaning on me at all. Far from it. My view remains the same, that we would not welcome [a] reception in parliament. And that’s when I stopped the ambassador and accredited Chinese from coming into the Commons.

Speaker of the House of Commons Lindsay Hoyle with King Charles III and Camilla, Queen Consort, in Westminster Hall at the Houses of Parliament on September 12.

“So let’s be clear, to hold a reception in the Commons when MPs and a peer has been sanctioned is not acceptable. My view remains the same and nothing has changed.”

The situation was complicated by the jurisdiction of Westminster Hall during the lying in state. The space is shared between the speakers of the Commons and the Lords and the Lord Great Chamberlain, who is appointed by the monarch.

Senior Conservatives said they felt betrayed by Hoyle after being assured last week that the Chinese would not be given access. Sir Iain Duncan Smith told The Sunday Telegraph: “It’s clear and obvious that the Establishment leant on the speakers to give way.

“The people that win at the end of the day are the Chinese Communist Party, which is a brutal, dictatorial and anti-human rights organisation, and all we’ve done is given them another victory. It looks like appeasement is back, alive and well in the British Establishment.”

A Foreign Office source denied the claim, saying: “The government did not put pressure on the Speaker.”

Wang Qishan with China's President Xi Jinping.

Last night (Sunday) Sir Kim Darroch, the former British ambassador to the US and a former national security adviser, defended the decision to invite countries with questionable human rights records, such as China and Saudi Arabia, to the state funeral.

He told Times Radio that it would be “little bit diminishing” if China had not been invited to the funeral and that it was “not a reward”. Darroch added: “There will have been Foreign Office advice on who should be invited. That will have been signed off in No10.

“This is the second biggest economy in the world. It’s the most populous nation in the world. I think it would be disappointing, you might even say a little bit diminishing, if you didn’t have a senior representative of China at this funeral.”

The Times