Beijing: UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer arrives in Beijing Wednesday for a four-day visit to China aimed at repairing ties and expanding opportunities for British businesses in the world’s second-largest economy.
He is the first British leader to come to Beijing since Theresa May in 2018. The relationship has deteriorated in recent years over growing concern about Chinese spying and surveillance, China’s support for Russia in the Ukraine war and Beijing’s crackdown on civil liberties in Hong Kong, the former British colony.
Those issues remain, but both sides are emphasising that they should “seek common ground while managing differences,” as Zheng Zeguang, China’s Ambassador to the UK, wrote in a commentary for The Times of London this week.
Selling services to China
Starmer, whose centre-left Labour Party government has struggled to deliver the economic growth it promised, is bringing a delegation of more than 60 British business and cultural leaders with him. His agenda includes Shanghai, the nation’s financial capital and a major port, as well as meeting Xi Jinping and other Chinese leaders in Beijing.
Wang Yiwei, a European affairs expert at Renmin University of China, said that Britain’s strengths in finance, consulting and other services dovetail well with a growing appetite in China for services such as health and elderly care. “It’s a huge market,” he said.
The UK had a trade deficit with China in 2025, importing more goods than it exported to the nation of 1.4 billion people, but it had a trade surplus in services.
“With recent Chinese policy directives focused on boosting domestic consumption and further opening the services sector to international businesses, we see significant opportunities for growth for UK businesses,” the China-Britain Business Council said.
The Trump factor
For many governments, the disruption to global trade under US President Donald Trump has made expanding trade and investment even more imperative.
Both Britain and China have been buffeted by US President Donald Trump’s tariffs and are seeking to diversify their overseas markets and the supply chains for their industries. Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney made a trip to China earlier this month with the same goals in mind.
The approach is not without risks. Trump has threatened to put a 100 per cent tariff on Canada if it reaches a trade deal with China, prompting a swift response from Carney. Canada and China have cut tariffs on a few sectors where these were recently imposed, but Canada has no intention of pursuing a free trade deal with Beijing, Carney said.
For many countries, the challenge is finding the right balance in an increasingly uncertain world.
Even China, a rising challenger to US dominance in the 21st century, cannot oppose America, Wang said, noting Trump’s planned visit in April.
“We are not against, but we criticise,” he said.
Spying and Hong Kong
Concern about spying or surveillance by China has risen sharply in many countries in recent years, complicating trade and overall relations. The UK has barred Chinese investment in sensitive telecoms infrastructure and squeezed China out of investment in new nuclear power plants, souring ties.
Starmer’s government has said it will protect national security while keeping up diplomatic dialogue and economic cooperation with the Asian superpower. The UK recently approved plans for a huge Chinese Embassy in London, removing a sticking point in relations and overriding claims by critics that the “mega-embassy” would make it easier for China to conduct espionage and intimidate dissidents.
Most Western governments come under pressure to raise human rights issues when they visit China, and the UK in particular, because of its links to Hong Kong, which was a British colony until 1997.
Starmer’s visit comes less than two months after a Hong Kong court convicted Jimmy Lai, a former newspaper publisher and a British citizen, under a national security law that Beijing imposed on the territory after massive pro-democracy protests in 2019.
Chris Patten, who was the British governor of Hong Kong from 1992 to 1997, said Starmer should be firm in raising disagreements over Lai’s imprisonment and other human rights issues.
