My Lord Mayor, Your Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen…
thank you for hosting me.
My thoughts are with all those affected by the tragic plane crash in Ahmedabad this morning.
I have been in touch with Minister Jaishankar to offer my condolences…
and the Foreign Office has stood up a crisis team to support British nationals and their families.
Tonight, I want to speak about power.
This is an audience which will understand that…
because the City’s financial power scales up every innovation…
and powers up the world economy.
Thank you for what you do.
I became MP for Tottenham 25 years ago.
I’ll be honest with you…
I didn’t feel that powerful for many of those years.
It was a long wait to become Foreign Secretary…
though not nearly as long as the wait for Tottenham to win a European trophy.
Politics and supporting Spurs…
if you stick at them…
pay off in the end.
I also want to thank the tens of thousands of diplomats, intelligence officers and development specialists…
that stand up for Britain in the world.
Together…
we’ve tackled wars, evacuations, hurricanes, …
and thanks to your work…
much of it classified…
we are all safer…
even if your Foreign Secretary is now a little greyer…
a little thinner…
and, I hope, a little wiser.
We do our work in the shadow of history.
Coming here tonight, I think of Anthony Eden, one of the first Foreign Secretaries to speak in this tradition.
But I do not think this is the new 1930s.
The more compelling reference point is 1925.
A century ago, our world was experiencing what the great historian Adam Tooze called a deluge of modernity.
New technologies…
new industries…
…shifted the balance of power.
There is a cheap reading of the 1920s…
that a Second World War was inevitable.
However, I’m not sure it was.
With the Locarno Treaties in 1925…
we almost got there.
Ultimately though, democracy failed to keep the peace.
I look back at 1925 today…
because 2025 is also a molten moment…
when the earth moves.
What we are living through is in fact a Great Remaking…
as modernity leaps forward and reshapes geopolitics.
In 2025, technology is power.
Nowhere do we see this more clearly than with China…
a great civilisation with a long history…
but today defined as much by their technological cutting edge as anything else.
Take DeepSeek…
revealing Chinese AI power.
BYD’s export boom…
revealing Chinese battery power.
And the Chang’e-6 moon landing…
revealing Chinese space power.
We cannot ignore how the West and Russia are no longer alone on the technological frontier.
Nor can we ignore the fact that China has installed more renewables capacity than the US, EU and India combined.
Britain will be dealing with the threats and opportunities Chinese technology poses for generations to come.
But it is the United States…
Britain’s closest ally….
that is the world’s leading technological power…
number one when it comes to biotech, AI and quantum.
But facing such a vast challenge, it is natural the Americans will focus more on the Indo-Pacific.
And they’ve repeatedly told us, facing Russia, we in Europe need to rely more on ourselves.
But to quote my friend Vice-President Vance:
“It’s completely ridiculous to think you’re ever going to be able to drive a wedge between the US and Europe.”
I agree with J.D. Vance…
though maybe not when it comes to his love for Diet Mountain Dew…
I prefer a full fat Coke.
The United States and China are doing remarkable things with new technology.
But this is the truth about power today…
technology is making it more diffuse.
Power is not just in the hands of the superstates…
nor the super-spoiler, Putin’s Russia.
Many powers are shaping this multipolar age.
Since 2000, Britain has more Nobel laureates for science than China, India and Russia combined.
South Korea makes more advanced semiconductors than China.
The UAE has reached Mars…
whilst Russia hasn’t been since the collapse of the USSR.
In 1997, when my party last came to power…
the US held the majority of the world’s top supercomputers.
Today, barely a third.
The cast-list of players is growing.
When the US talks to Russia, they both head to Riyadh…
when they talk to China, they both come to London.
This large group of states, together, are the new great powers.
This is also our age.
Your Excellencies, that’s why I want to work even more closely with even more of you…
some as allies, some as partners…
some of you on everything, some of you on single issues.
We are not all the same.
We do not agree on everything.
But together, we can build new constellations and coalitions which give us all a seat at the table.
This is at the heart of our offer to the Global South and our new Approach to the continent Africa.
It is the core of what I mean by progressive realism.
Cooperation, not condescension.
Listening, not lectures.
A realpolitik of progress.
For Britain, progressive realism means listening…
deepening…
and toughening up.
For years…
friends from Africa to Eastern Europe have been saying Britain needs to do more to tackle dirty money.
Kleptocrats and money launderers rob all our citizens of wealth and security.
We don’t need to wait for superpowers…
we can clamp down on blatant theft ourselves.
And so I can announce today that London will host a Countering Illicit Finance Summit…
…bringing together a broad coalition for action.
I will never allow London mansions to be the bitcoin of kleptocrats.
We will expose them.
We will punish them.
And drive them out of our city.
In the Middle East, I personally find the horrific suffering of civilians in Gaza intolerable.
We all want to see an immediate ceasefire…
the release of all the hostages…
the end of Hamas’ reign of terror.
That’s why Britain is leading efforts to break the deadlock through new coalitions.
I can hear others’ desire for peace.
With France and Canada…
we sent a clear warning in May that Israel must stop its assault on Gaza.
With Australia, Canada, Norway and New Zealand…
we’ve sanctioned those inciting violence against Palestinians in the West Bank…
the territory that must form the heart of a future Palestinian state.
We support the Gulf’s indispensable work on mediation and a plan for the day after.
Because the two-state solution is the only path to a lasting peace.
But progressive realism is not only about this…
but deepening Britain’s alliances and partnerships.
We actually delivered three deals in two weeks with three of the world’s greatest economies.
And that’s not all we’ve achieved – we are injecting real momentum into so many of Britain’s partnerships.
We’re delivering deals for climate…
launching the Global Clean Power Alliance in Brazil…
partnering with my friend Mia Mottley’s Bridgetown Initiative…
securing a climate tech partnership with Qatar.
Jobs in Cambridge, jobs in Southampton.
We’re delivering deals for defence…
the ITAR breakthrough with our AUKUS partners…
progress in our new fighter jet programme with Italy and Japan.
Jobs in Glasgow, jobs in Reading.
We’re delivering deals for growth…
massive investments from America’s Universal…
Japan’s car giants…
German manufacturers…
and Saudi investors.
Jobs in Bedford, jobs in north Wales, jobs in Northern Ireland.
Crucially, we’re also delivering deals on irregular migration.
Better cooperation with the Balkans…
new returns agreements with Iraq and Moldova…
the world’s first sanctions regime targeting smuggling gangs and their enablers.
This is now a priority for the Foreign Office in a way it never was before.
This is us playing our bit ensuring those with no right to be here piling pressure on our public services.
When partners step up on irregular migration…
this is transforming our wider relationship.
But if they are unwilling to do so…
then that has to have consequences for what we can offer them in return.
And finally, progressive realism is about toughening up.
I came into politics inspired by the generation who were tested by war in Bosnia and Kosovo.
My generation here in Europe is the Kyiv generation…
one that has toughened up.
The view from that night train to visit President Zelenskyy is not simply out into darkness…
…but into history in the making.
You feel what a journey Europe has been on since 2022.
Britain has toughened up.
As Secretary of State for GCHQ and SIS…
I am proud that we are investing £600 million in the UK intelligence community…
so our spies can defend our way of life.
As a result, I can confirm today that Britain will spend two point six per cent of GDP on defence from 2027.
This is a generational uplift…
keeping working people safe.
Our soldiers and our intelligence staff are ready to compete with our adversaries.
And with the new counter-hybrid taskforce I am announcing today…
our diplomats too will be ready for this murky new age of sabotage and subterfuge…
where technology is power.
And I know…
Europe has toughened up too…
switching to Putin-free energy…
as the EU goes further than ever before with common borrowing for military spending.
Putin believes that we, as Europeans, are unable to stick it out for years to come.
But just as Ukraine’s heroes have surprised the Kremlin with their endurance…
so too has Europe been astounding the Kremlin with our dogged persistence in standing with Zelenskyy.
Today, we had confirmation that Russian casualties in this senseless war have reached one million.
Every one a reminder that this war is not only a crime against the Ukrainian people…
but a waste of young Russian lives…
yet more blood on the Kremlin’s hands.
With grit, we will prove Putin wrong.
Europe is not afraid to stand up and fight.
Our Plan for Change…
our international strategy…
is delivering for working people.
I can see Britain in the years to come…
safer…
greener…
richer…
happier…
if we stick to the Plan.
For me, patriotism has always been about realism…
And, of course, football!
Taking the world as it is, not as we wish it to be.
Taking ourselves as we are, and being proud of it.
Taking actions that are both astute and bold.
This is our realpolitik.
A realpolitik of progress.
A realpolitik for Britain.
Thank you.