His laptop and phone were taken – this may have enabled his Signal chats to be downloaded.
Berry later messaged Cash about it.
Cash says he had not been alarmed by this: “I thought it was just standard… for a guy who’d been in China.”
As the investigation progressed, it became clear the authorities believed Cash and Berry had been involved in an informal, but dangerous, exchange of information that was “prejudicial to the safety and interests of the UK”.
The allegations were based on 6,273 messages between the pair – the same ones Cash has now shared with the BBC. Cash’s solicitor has told the BBC they are genuine.
They cover a period when Cash had joined the China Research Group (CRG), founded by Tugendhat and fellow Tory MP Alicia Kearns, and when Berry was working for a Chinese company called Strong, where part of his work involved writing political and economic reports for clients.
According to court documents, Berry was said to have compiled 34 reports for a man linked to the Chinese state spy agency, relaying information passed on to him by Cash. Strong did not respond to the BBC’s request for comment.
The CRG’s office was across the Thames from Westminster, but Cash regularly had meetings in Parliament. Cash did not have government security clearance and there is no evidence he had access to classified documents.
Despite being thousands of miles apart, the two friends remained in close contact, often messaging daily.
The messages reviewed by the BBC show them discussing topics including sanctions on China, the tech company Huawei, human rights, Hong Kong, Taiwan and British foreign policy.
Cash says he used the Signal app for almost all his contacts with people in China – “more for their protection” – as he says discussing the government “could land someone… in trouble”. He and Berry did not use the app’s “disappearing messages” function.
Much of the information they discussed was publicly available, says Cash – who has given the BBC a detailed spreadsheet with links and references in an attempt to prove it.
But sometimes he did share with Berry his impressions from meetings and private discussions in Westminster. On 12 occasions in the messages, he labelled information “off the record” or “very off the record” before passing it on.
Cash says this was “just me excitedly sharing things that I was doing with him at work”.
One message recounted views allegedly expressed in private by Britain’s then-ambassador to China, Dame Caroline Wilson, during a discussion with the CRG about its work on China’s influence on UK universities.
Cash also messaged Berry sharing unverified rumours about the sex lives of two UK cabinet ministers. There is no evidence Berry passed this to his Chinese colleagues.
Cash says he regarded such exchanges as routine political discussion. “We weren’t working with classified information,” he says.
