Experts cast doubt on Trump’s claim of ‘comprehensive’ UK-US trade deal – UK politics live

The World at One interviewed Timothy C Brightbill, the American trade lawyer quoted in the New York Times today commenting on the US-UK trade deal. (See 12.38pm.) Brightbill told the programme that he thought the deal would be a “solid step forward by the administration, potentially starting to move the United States away from a trade war posture and back towards a more normal bilateral trade relationship with a key US ally”.

More than 40 Labour MPs have warned the prime minister that planned disability cuts are “impossible to support” and have called for a pause and change in direction, Jessica Elgot reports.

There is a full list of the Labour MPs who have signed the letter here.

Here is the latest assessment of what will be in today’s US-UK trade deal from Robert Peston from ITV News.

Today’s agreement between the UK and US is principally about cuts to Trump’s 25% tariff on £10bn of UK car exports to US and £3bn of steel and aluminium exports. I assume it will fine down to Trump’s baseline global 10% tariff. A wider more ambitious UK/US trade agreement is still months years away. For these initial tariff reductions, Starmer is NOT cutting or scrapping the Digital Services Tax, which raises £800m per annum from the likes of Amazon, Meta and Google – but that tax is likely to be in play during the next round of negotiations

At the Downing Street lobby briefing the PM’s spokesperson ducked questions about whether President Trump was right to say the US-UK trade deal is “full and comprehensive”. (See 11.31am.)

Asked if this was right, the spokesperson said:

We’ve always been clear that we want to do a deal that’s in the British national interest, and support a substantial UK-US trading relationship. Those talks are continuing and we look forward to providing an update later today.

The spokesperson also said that Keir Starmer would be describing it in his own words when he speaks later today.

Trump’s language is best understood by reference to a famous passage in his 1987 book Art of the Deal where he said, essentially, it was always good to exaggerate. Trump said:

The final key to the way I promote is bravado. I play to people’s fantasies. People may not always think big themselves, but they can still get very excited by those who do. That’s why a little hyperbole never hurts. People want to believe that something is the biggest and the greatest and the most spectacular.

I call it truthful hyperbole. It’s an innocent form of exaggeration – and a very effective form of promotion.

That was almost 40 years ago. Since then Trump has become a bit less fussy about the “truthful” bit, but it remains a useful description of his outlook.

Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, has said she wants to see trade barriers between the UK and the rest of the word fall, ahead of the expected announcement about a US-UK trade deal.

She told reporters today’s announcement follows a deal with India and comes ahead of the UK-EU summit later this month which is also expected to focus on smoothing trade.

Reeves said: “We want to see trade barriers between the UK and countries around the world fall.”

Kitty Donaldson in the i has published what it says are fresh details of what will be in the US-UK trade deal. She describes it as a “solid agreement” and says it will include:

Other reports have said that the deal will include the UK cutting its tariffs on car, meat and shellfish imports from the US.

James Cartlidge, the shadow defence secretary, was non-committal when asked about the US-UK trade deal in interviews this morning. (See 7.54am). Earlier this week the Conservative party initially welcome the UK-India trade deal – before criticising it about half an hour later, once Tories had had time to look at the detail.

But the Tory MP Julian Smith, a former chief whip, has praised the government for its work on this deal. He posted this on social media.

Politics & details aside, today’s trade deal with the US is testament to the patient, mediation-led approach @Keir_Starmer & his team have taken to the US over recent months. Quiet diplomacy has led the UK to the front of the queue.

In an assessment for the BBC, Faisal Islam, its economics editor, says the US-UK trade deal being announced today is “likely to be relatively small”. He says: “It’s about the rolling back of some of the trade damage done by Donald Trump’s original announcement.”

The BBC has a good guide to what the deal is likely to contain here.

At the Downing Street lobby briefing the PM’s spokesperson insisted that the US-UK deal being announced today would be in the national interest. He said:

We’ve always been clear that we want to do deals in the British national interest which support the substantial UK-US trading relationship, and those talks are continuing. We look forward to providing an update later today.

We have taken a calm and pragmatic approach to these talks.

We have always been clear on our red lines when it comes to food standards. We’re not going to lower British food standards.

At the Bank of England press conference, Andrew Bailey, the governor, said it was “excellent” news that the UK and the US have agreed a trade deal. But he said the UK economy would still be impacted by the effect of US tariffs on global trade.

He said the Bank had not been briefed on what was in the deal. But he said the Bank welcomed the news that a deal has been agreed. He went on:

We welcome that news. I very much welcome it, and I think it’s very well done to those involved. And the reason for saying that is that it will help to reduce uncertainty, and that’s important, as you’ll see in the context of what we’ve said today.

The UK is, though, a very open economy, so the UK is also affected by the way in which trade policy and tariffs affect, obviously, other economies – that is, in other words, the tariff measures that have been taken in respect of other economies.

I say that because I hope the UK agreement, if it is indeed announced this afternoon, will be the first of many. This will be good news all round, including for the UK economy.

But it is excellent, if it is indeed the case this afternoon, that the UK is leading the way. And I do congratulate both those in the UK who are involved, and those in the US too.

Graeme Wearden has full coverage of Bailey’s press conference on his business live blog.

In his post on Truth Social Donald Trump said that trade deal with the UK would be “full and comprehensive”. (See 11.31am.)

But commentators and journalists who have been briefed on what to expect are suggesting it will be much more limited.

Speaking on the Today programme this morning, Jonathan Haskel, an economics professor and a former member of the Bank of England’s monetary policy committee, said:

People should remember that there’s a very big difference between trade deals and trade agreements.

Trade deals are limited and short-term and partial, just covering a few items. Trade agreements are broad based and long term.

Now, in his Truth Social post [the first one – see 6.59am] Mr Trump announced that this was a trade deal. So I’d urge people not to expect very much.

The Financial Times is reporting that “British officials acknowledge [the deal] will fall far short of the kind of comprehensive post-Brexit free trade agreement targeted by the past Conservative government”.

In its report on the trade deal, the New York Times says:

Timothy C. Brightbill, an international trade attorney at Wiley Rein, said the announcement would probably be “just an agreement to start the negotiations, identifying a framework of issues to be discussed in the coming months.”

“We suspect that tariff rates, nontariff barriers and digital trade are all on the list — and there are difficult issues to address on all of these,” he added.

This how Politico sums up what we are expecting.

This was never meant to be a comprehensive free trade agreement (FTA) with the U.S., of the sort that previous Tory governments tried and failed to win. Instead, this had been pitched by U.K. officials as a narrow economic pact to avoid tariffs and work together on AI and critical tech. How narrow or otherwise, we should know soon.

And Sky News is reporting that nothing will actually be signed today. It says:

No physical UK-US trade document will be signed today, Sky News understands.

That’s because the announcement from London and Washington is around what’s being described as the general terms of an agreement, rather than a full fat trade deal.

A big India-style agreement, this is not.

Bank of England policymakers have cut interest rates by a quarter point to 4.25% to cushion the UK economy against the impact of Donald Trump’s trade war, Heather Stewart reports.

Graeme Wearden has more on this on his business live blog. He will be covering the Bank of England’s press conference starting at 12.30pm.

Here are some more pictures from the Service of Thanksgiving at Westminster Abbey to mark the 80th anniversary of VE Day.

Ministers have insisted that food standards were a “red line” in the trade talks with the US.

During environment questions, in response to a question from the Lib Dem Tim Farron, Steve Reed, the environment secretary, said:

We have been crystal clear – we have red lines in this. We will not be allowing British farmers to be undercut on environmental or welfare standards in the way that the Conservatives did when they agreed a trade deal with Australia that undercut British farmers and caused immense damage to them.

And, during business questions, in response to a question from the Tory Mark Pritchard, the leader of the Commons, Lucy Powell, said:

[Pritchard] will be aware that the issues that he raises of food standards and agriculture have been red lines for this government in those trade talks, and he will get the details later today.

Labour is being urged to safeguard the future of the BBC by mutualising it. Under the plan, set out in a report from the leftwing thinktank Common Wealth, all UK residents would become “members” of the BBC, with a members council, selected by lot, helping to oversee how it is run.

Lisa Nandy, the culture secretary, spoke in favour of the mutualistion concept when she was an opposition MP and the thinktank hopes to persuade her to revive the idea. It says:

When the next BBC Royal Charter takes effect, interactive digital platforms and personalised streaming services will have replaced broadcasting as the central means by which we make sense of the world through news, entertainment and culture. The BBC will either take a leading role in this new media and communications landscape, or it will fade into irrelevance.

If the BBC is to survive and flourish it will need to become a new kind of institution, one in which the active and direct participation of citizens informs and invigorates the BBC’s public service mission. This is why we agree with Lisa Nandy that mutualisation is the right way forward for the BBC. Without it, the BBC faces a bleak future of dwindling audiences, collapsing funding and continued political interference.

Welcoming the report, the Labour MP Alex Sobel said:

Public control of the BBC through co-operative ownership is the most sustainable option for our national broadcasting service. It’s absolutely right that those who fund the BBC are given a substantial say in how their money is spent. That’s why launching a transparent system of public representation and participation to replace the top down-monolithic decision-making structure is long overdue.

Donald Trump has posted a new message about the US-UK trade deal due to be announced this afternoon. In a post on his Truth Social network, he claims it will be “full and comprehensive” – despite experts saying that what is likely to be announced will be much more limited than the sort of full-spectrum trade agreement recently announced between the UK and India.

Trump also claims that it is a “great honour” to have the UK as the recipient of the first trade deal signed since he upended world trade by imposing global tariffs – prompting dozens of countries to head to the US offering deals that might persuade Trump to reduce the tariffs he had imposed on them.

Trump said:

The agreement with the United Kingdom is a full and comprehensive one that will cement the relationship between the United States and the United Kingdom for many years to come. Because of our long time history and allegiance together, it is a great honor to have the United Kingdom as our FIRST announcement. Many other deals, which are in serious stages of negotiation, to follow!

Lucy Powell, the leader of the Commons, has given an unequivocal apology for appearing to suggest that politicians raise concerns about grooming gangs as a “dog whistle”.

Speaking in the Commons this morning, she went further than she did at the weekend when she issued a statement that she said was intended to “clarify” what she meant, adding that she was “sorry if this was unclear”.

Powell was on the Radio 4’s Any Questions at the end of last week when a fellow panellist, the Reform UK- supporting commentator Tim Montgomerie, started talking about grooming gangs. Powell replied:

Oh, we want to blow that little trumpet now, do we? Yeah, OK, let’s get that dog whistle out.

The phrase “dog whistle” is used in politics to refer to language that contains hidden meaning for a particular audience – normally in a way that signifies support for racist views, without that being explicit.

During business questions, Jesse Norman, the shadow leader of the Commons said that Powell’s comment was “indefensible” and that her statement at the weekend “conspicuously did not contain an apology”.

In response, Powell thanked Normal for raising this issue and said she wanted to be “absolutely clear” in her message to MPs, and also to victims and survivors of abuse. She went on:

I am very sorry for those remarks, as I made clear over the weekend.

I and every member of this government want your truth to be heard wherever that truth leads. Your truly appalling experiences need to be acted on, for those responsible to be accountable and face the full force of the law and for justice to be served.

I would never want to leave the impression that these very serious, profound and far-reaching issues, which I have campaigned on for many years, should be shied away from and not aired. Far from it. No stone will be left unturned.

And what the victims want first and foremost is for actions to be taken and for the many, many recommendations from the previous inquiry to be implemented in full, including mandatory reporting of child sexual abuse – something I have called for for nearly a decade. Shockingly, these recommendations remain sitting on the shelf until we came into government last year.