Osborne: You cannot fail to be staggered by China He used it, too, to reinforce some of his political interests: opponents of HS2 will note that he pointedly travelled on China's booming high speed network and posed in front of the on-board speedometer as it reached 300kph (186mph). He must have surprised his hosts with his insistence on using a people carrier and his willingness to carry his own luggage, and it is hard to imagine his Chinese counterpart enduring with the same wry amusement being led into the depths of a Chinese shopping centre by the British consul in Hong Kong and then getting lost. On the occasions when he escaped formalities to wander along street markets to buy presents for his children, his tour also allowed him to see the extraordinary social and cultural advances that China is going through. When we eventually sat down for a formal interview on his last day, in a tiny cabin on the ocean ferry to Hong Kong, Mr Osborne was evidently galvanised by what he had seen and learnt, and itching to take on those who caution against engaging with the world's largest dictatorship. Throughout, it seemed, China's success stood as a reproach to Britain's loss of ambition. Everywhere he looked he saw modern China marked by skyscrapers and a frenzy of building. You cannot fail to be staggered by the scale of the economic progress and the building that's happening all around you. It's astonishing," he said. I feel both energised by a trip like this because there's so much more Britain can be doing; I also feel a bit like, my God, we've really got to up our game as a country, and the whole of the West has to understand what is happening here in Asia. Does China teach us that we have lost our capacity for hard work? He points out the obvious cultural and political differences. "I'm not sure anyone in Britain would want to have imposed on them the Chinese work ethic," he laughs. "But I do think there's an ambition in the country and a sense of optimism and 'can do" which our country had in the Victorian age and had at other points in our history." Had, and needs to get back. He felt that acutely on a visit to the Taishan nuclear power station, the world's biggest power project and a joint venture by the French energy company EDF and the Chinese, which is a model for what is to be built at Hinkley Point in Somerset. Britain had the world's first civil nuclear programme but allowed it to die out. Somewhere along the line in Britain there were bits that were great about British industry that we allowed to wither. He adds: "There has been at times in Britain a sense of defeatism. You saw that [defeatism] three years ago when everyone thought we couldn't tackle our debt problems and the financial crisis had relegated us to a second-rate power. I hope that what we have shown in the past few years is an ambition to say 'no," absolutely not, Britain can be the best." It was a theme he raised in his conference speech, the 'can do" spirit that led us to split the atom or discover DNA. "There's a role for political leadership in all of this, there's a job for the nation's politicians to try and create a national mood of 'we can do it, we can provide better living standards to our children than the ones we enjoyed ourselves."" He wants Britain to learn a different story about China from the clichés about a communist sweatshop that he noted in Ed Miliband's conference speech. I'm not particularly aiming this at the Labour Party because it's an attitude you find in quite a lot of places in Britain. China is not a sweatshop. Yes, it has cheap manufacturing by people on low wages, but he pointed to Tencent and Huawei, two internet and telecommunications companies he visited that are now global forces for innovation and design. China is different. If we have just a black-and-white view of China as a communist country of cheap manufacturing and the only thing we want out of them is access to their market then we are missing out in a very big way as a country. It's precisely why he chose to hold a dinner not for bankers and industrialists but for British designers, artists, video game specialists and new media entrepreneurs working in China who embody the potential for lucrative creative exchanges. What does he say to those who fear China's dark side? We've got to start by understanding that China is an ancient civilisation with a long and proud history. China's growth has lifted hundreds of millions out of poverty, he points out. It is sometimes easy to forget that within our lifetime it was a country of famine. But it is precisely because China is what it is, that some are worried. His delegation, for example, had to bring disposable telephones, such is the ferocity of Chinese hacking and cyber-espionage. He is sanguine. We have to be very clear that China is absolutely determined to follow its national self-interest, that it's run by a communist party, that there is in the Western sense no freedom of the press, and human rights are a big issue. But to ignore therefore a country that is the second largest economy in the world would be "a massive mistake." China, he points out, is engaged in a form of "challenging" internal dialogue. Of course you are not going to get people criticising the president of China, because it's not a democracy. But look beneath that and understand there is a big national discussion going on about the future direction of China and that's pretty healthy. He tries to be equally reassuring about the prospect of state-owned Chinese firms owning and running new nuclear plants in Britain. Our safety standards and security rules will protect us from harm, he says, "not that any harm is meant." That's quite a confident statement. Others may disagree. As a politician presiding over a government with no money, he points out other advantages: better the Chinese pay than the British taxpayer. "We free up taxpayer money for other things we might want to spend it on and, by the way, it means we don't have to levy so much in tax," he says. He rejects as "condescending" the idea that we have nothing to learn from a country that is running the world's biggest civil nuclear programme. We should treat the Chinese as equals, not as superiors or inferiors. I don't accept at all that we are a supplicant nation. Far from it: we can be real equal partners in trying to grow both our economies. He returned to London to find the Labour lead in the polls squeezed to near nothing and a growing sense among Tories that they have seen off Ed Miliband's populist lunge on energy prices. Mr Osborne contrasts what he says is the Conservative willingness to advance often difficult arguments, with Labour's lack of any clear theme. I didn't hear anything from the Labour Party that would do anything to dispel the notion that it has a weak leader and no credible economic policy. Mr Miliband is the weakest Labour leader "of my lifetime." The standing committee of the Chinese politburo is more market-oriented, he half jokes. Mr Miliband's tax on business would surprise the Chinese. All his instincts are to intervene and to tax and do things that will destroy jobs and make Britain a less friendly place for investment. His central point is that politics requires making unpopular choices. If you set out to offend no one you are going to achieve very little in politics. This Government has shown a willingness to court unpopularity by backing high speed rail or planning reform. If we aren't, then what's the point of doing a job like this if all you are doing is being driven by last night's focus groups? But isn't he under pressure from his own side to match Mr Miliband's offer of an energy price freeze with a gimmick of his own? He says he feels under pressure to make the economy grow better. But I do not feel under pressure to match gimmick for gimmick. If anything, we are winning this argument with the British public precisely because we have been consistent, we have continued to put a grown-up argument to a grown-up country. His China tour allowed Mr Osborne to advance the work of restoring his reputation as the Conservatives" most astute and interesting politician. By a coincidence that looked calculated, he was shadowed throughout by his friend and rival Boris Johnson, who was on his own eastern tour. The London Mayor was, by his standards, well behaved. But the Chancellor is never one to miss a chance to do some political business. Which is why the most fascinating moment of the trip may have been when the two men met for a quiet dinner in Hong Kong before returning to the fray back home.