Chinese work conditions like battery chickendom

IT’S a bit worrying when the Chinese start building nuclear power plants next door and are given the full state banquet treatment by our neighbours in Downing Street and Buckingham Palace, writes Suzanne Harrington.

It’s not the Chinese per se which are a cause for concern — or even nuclear power, which at this stage, according to veteran environmentalists Steward Brand and James Lovelock, are now essential for human survival.

It’s not even their human rights record; the Chinese state may execute more of its citizens than any other place on earth, but so does Texas and we seem to not mind very much. As does Saudi Arabia, even as its ruling theocracy continues to mull over granting half of its population the right to vote (the half in possession of vaginas, obviously). It hasn’t put us off doing deals with them over the years, has it?