XI JINPING is the first Chinese president to come to Britain on a state visit in 10 years.

George Osborne is making a high-profile play to “partner China,” the Dalai Lama laments: “Money, money, money … but where is morality?” and there may well be numbers of Labour members who share his sentiments.

However, building a constructive relationship with China is vital for the future of our economy, from high-tech manufacturing, to universities, to cultural industries — and, as John McDonnell says, we need pragmatism as well as idealism.

China is near to overtaking the US as the world’s largest economy and will grow at two to three times the US rate in coming years. Last year, it contributed nearly 40 per cent of the world’s economic growth.

Under Labour, our economic relations with China fell well behind those of Germany and France, especially following Tony Blair’s meeting with the Dalai Lama in 1999.

By 2009, Britain accounted for a mere 10 per cent of EU exports to China. The new Labour leadership needs to consider the lessons.

China is one of the few countries able and willing to fund much-needed infrastructure development in Britain.

Incoming investment flows are now increasing, directly supporting over a quarter of a million jobs, a figure set to grow.

Osborne aims to raise Britain-China trade volumes to £30 billion by 2020. Labour will heed equally ambitious plans if it is to demonstrate to voters that it can deliver for the future.

China’s advances in science and innovation may well bring competition into areas of Britain’s core technologies by 2020.

But the challenge comes with new opportunities — the enormous demands of its own development create openings for others to grow “with and within China,” by helping to “go green” and to build a modern welfare system, for example.

As the huge potential of Chinese consumers is unleashed, exchanging access to advanced technologies for market access would be a win-win. We should match what we are good at with what China needs, and innovate together.

The TUC recognised as much in its Way of the Dragon report last year.

The United Nations conference on trade and development, US economist Joseph Stiglitz and others go further to explore global industrial policies. Both renewable energy and steel are good candidates for industrial co-ordination and restructuring on a worldwide basis.

It is not Osborne but Labour-led administrations, such as London under Ken Livingstone, and Manchester, twinned for 30 years with Wuhan, that have been the China partnership pioneers.

Chinese cities are likely to contribute some 25 per cent of world growth between 2010 and 2025, making city-to-city links especially important for the economy, potentially empowering the Labour-led cities that remain a key base of the party.

Plans initiated by China for the new “Silk Road” network of rail, roads, ports and communication highways across Eurasia are opening a new era in world development, and Britain must find a role within it. 

For Europe, these Asian links are a counterbalance to their current over-dependence on transatlanticism.

China is now starting to shape agendas for a progressive multipolar world, shifting international discourse towards issues of state-led investment in infrastructure, sustainable macroeconomic policy — monetary and fiscal together — new notions of security as well as transforming world agendas on human development.

China clearly wants to do international relations in a different way. There is far greater potential here for constructive discussion between Labour and China than could ever exist with the Tories, bringing benefits not just to big business.

Xi’s crackdown on dissidents is clearly unpalatable for Labour, but judgements should be balanced — China has lifted over 728 million people out of poverty since 1981, contributing over 70 per cent of the Millennium Development 2015 Goal of halving world poverty.

Its progress in infant and maternal mortality is recognised as exceptional. It ranks 91 out of 144 countries in the Human Development Index, well ahead of other densely populated Asian countries such as Indonesia (108) and India (135).

Even Amnesty International, ever critical, recognises improvements in labour rights, the legal system and human rights education.

Chinese diplomacy works by “setting aside differences to seek common ground.” The smart way forward is to focus first on areas of common interest where there is mutual benefit, then, with the relationship strengthened, move on to the more difficult issues.

China is open to human rights dialogue, but on the basis of equality and mutual learning. In recent discussions with President Barack Obama, Xi noted that democracy and human rights are a “common pursuit,” and that China is in a process “to realise social fairness and justice and continuously promote the development of the human rights cause.”

The new Labour leadership must weigh up its priorities — would they be able to deliver their economic plans for Britain, not least in defence diversification, without a good relationship with China?

Should not China’s non-interventionism be recognised as a positive contribution to world peace?

China does not drop bombs on other people — it is the only major power not bombing the Middle East — and it does not try to interfere in other countries’ political systems.

It is the only major power which does not have military bases beyond its borders. At the very least it is clear that there is an urgent need to broaden debate about China within the labour movement.

Corbynomics and China

People’s quantitative easing
IN 2009, China pumped £600bn directly into its economy, producing double-digit growth for the following three years so preventing the world financial crisis and recession from turning into a world depression. If this isn’t an example of “people’s QE,” what is?

Investment for growth
PLANS for a national investment bank might draw on the experience of the Chinese government, which controls all the country’s major banks and has invested heavily, especially in infrastructure to promote growth.
The Chinese-initiated state-led multilateral investment banks — the Brics bank and the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank — are setting new international agendas.

Public ownership
WITH John McDonnell calling for “modern alternative public, co-operative, worker-controlled and genuinely mutual forms of ownership,” and China’s state-owned enterprises experimenting in employee share ownership, there are exciting opportunities to exchange ideas.
China can learn from Britain about co-operative enterprises, while Britain could learn about China’s state shareholding “dividends for welfare” schemes.

New concepts of security

Common security and peacekeeping
SPEAKING to the UN in September, Xi Jinping stated that “no country can achieve stability out of other countries’ instability,” and called for the cold war mentality to be replaced with “a new vision of common, comprehensive, co-operative and sustainable security.”
He further announced plans to set up a permanent UN peacekeeping force of 8,000 troops, promising $1bn for a UN “peace and development fund.”

Promoting stability in Syria and Venezuela
CHINA supports a stronger role for the UN and its security council in ending conflict and keeping peace, and maintains that the global campaign against terrorism should be led by the UN.
It has been working continuously for Syrian peace talks, maintaining its own links with all forces ready to engage in dialogue.
With Venezuela facing new US destabilisation efforts, China not only honours but is extending its commitments for substantial loans.

Towards nuclear disarmament
UNLIKE the other officially recognised nuclear weapons states, China is committed to “no first use” and supports a nuclear weapons convention.
Why not open discussion on a Britain-China mutual nuclear weapons non-targeting agreement?