Many friends indicated Express was down almost an entire week surrounding the big meetings. Not as reliable as it once was. Or so they say
Doesn't matter if it's not "private" if you have certified encryption though, right?
I think his assertion is that as it is "allowed" by China's government that they somehow have access to the keys (or the VPN provider is keeping a buffer of the traffic and has an arrangement to provide it to relevant government agencies upon request).
When I was in China last April, SSTP worked fine (though long-lived connections tend to become slower over time, and then need a few minutes of cool down before being usable again). Most Chinese people I met were using shadowsocks.