UK PM May says she wants free trade deal with China

Britain is seeking a free trade agreement with China, Prime Minister Theresa May said on Wednesday as she travelled for talks with Chinese leaders, adding that more should be done immediately to open up market access for British firms.

"China is a country that we want to do a trade deal with," May told reporters aboard her Royal Air Force jet on the way to Wuhan, a university city where she will announce half a billion pounds worth of education deals.

"But I think that there is more we can be doing in the interim, doing right now in terms of looking at potential barriers to trade and the opening up of markets to ensure, I want to see, obviously, British businesses able to do good trade into China," she said.

May also said she would raise the future of Hong Kong in her meeting with President Xi Jinping, underlining Britain's commitment to the "one country, two systems" rule in the former British colony.