Will Keir Starmer's trip to China give the British economy a boost?

Live from the UK, this is the Marketplace Morning Report from the BBC World Service.

I'm William Lee Adams. Good morning.

The British Prime Minister, Sir Keir Starmer, is in Beijing, working on the UK's trade ties with China.

The BBC's Surinjana-Tawari has been following the trip. Hi, Sir Injana.

Hi there. So the British Prime Minister isn't just in China to talk diplomacy. Business is on the

agenda. What's being discussed? Yeah, so the two leaders met earlier today and Sir Kier Starrmer said that he wanted a more sophisticated

relationship with China.

Now he's in China with dozens of business leaders, some of the world's biggest companies,

AstraZeneca, HSBC, Octopus Energy among them, Jaguar Land Rover is another one.

And it's expected that the two sides will

agree on some economic partnerships, perhaps some deals, in order to strengthen their trade

relationship. Both of these economies are not doing so well. Growth is slow, demand is down,

investment is down as well. So the trip comes at a time

when the two leaders really need each other for their own economies as well. Has anything

concrete been agreed or is it too early? We haven't had any deals yet, but there have been

lots of talk around which sectors there might be deals in, there might be agreements

and future partnerships as well. And those are areas where the UK, for example, is very

competitive. Think financial services, education services and green technology as well. That's

an area that China is really buckling down on and investing in, and it needs

some of the services that the UK supplies. Several Western leaders have been in Beijing recently.

Are these visits connected to their more fractious relationship with the US?

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