Bank of England governor to visit China with Chancellor

Bank of England Governor Andrew Bailey will accompany Chancellor Rachel Reeves to China next month, Sky News said on Saturday, a visit intended to revive high-level economic and financial talks that have been frozen since 2019.

Sky News said Bailey was expected to hold talks with Pan Gongsheng, the governor of the People’s Bank of China, and that Nikhil Rathi, the chief executive of the Financial Conduct Authority, would also accompany Reeves.

The Bank of England has declined to comment when asked if Bailey would travel to China with Reeves.

Britain suspended most economic dialogues with China in 2020 after Beijing imposed a national security law in Hong Kong, a former British colony. Since then, spying allegations, the war in Ukraine, and the sanctioning of lawmakers have increased tensions between the two countries.

The Labour government, in power in Britain since July, has made improving ties with China one of its main foreign policy goals after a period under successive Conservative governments when relations plunged to their lowest in decades.

Reporting by Chandni Shah in Bengaluru and Catarina Demony in London, Reuters