Britain’s hopes of building a deep security partnership with the EU have been cast into fresh doubt after Brussels issued a warning to EU member states that the British government cannot be trusted to handle sensitive crime data, the Telegraph can reveal.

The potentially provocative move by the European Commission’s Brexit negotiating team has raised questions among British officials about whether Europe is “really serious” about having an enduring and stable relationship with the UK after Brexit.

It comes after UK ministers threatened this week to quit the EU’s new €10bn Galileo satellite network over EU threats to block the UK from using its military applications because of concerns over the UK’s data security standards.

In the latest twist in the deepening row, The Telegraph understand that Michel Barnier’s Brexit negotiating team deliberately flagged up an EU report that criticised the UK for its performance in the Schengen Information System II, the EU’s crime-fighting database.

The EU evaluation report, which was approved on April 12, found “serious deficiencies” in the way the UK participated in SIS II, including handing sensitive crime data over to private contractors and failing to respond adequately to requests from other EU member states.

The report, which found basic errors such as the UK using sub-standard IT systems to view sensitive crime data, is another embarrassment for the Home Office in a week where its failings have been highlighted over rising knife-crime and the Windrush immigration scandal.