Keir Starmer warns Donald Trump against UK tariffs in first Liaison Committee grilling

Evening Standard

Sir Keir Starmer has warned Donald Trump against imposing tariffs on the UK, saying he is “not a fan” of protectionist measures.The Prime Minister said he was “alive to the danger of tariffs” and stressed the importance of avoiding them to maintain strong trade relations with the US.During his first appearance in front of the Liaison Committee, Sir Keir was quizzed on how he plans to dissuade the president-elect from pursuing tariffs.Sir Keir said: “I am not going to speculate as to what he is going to do. It won’t come as any surprise to you that I am not a fan of tariffs and therefore we have to make sure that we avoid tariffs.“We have got very good trade with the US as we have got very good traded with other countries around the world. I want to improve on that and as you will know I have had a meeting with president Trump in September in New York, I have had a number of phone calls since including one yesterday.”

Transcript

00:00Amongst the perils that the US face next year is obviously now the looming threat of tariffs.

00:05So what are you going to do to dissuade President-elect Trump from imposing tariffs on the UK?

00:11Well, I'm not going to speculate as to what he is going to do.

00:15It won't come as any surprise to you that I'm not a fan of tariffs

00:19and therefore we have to make sure that we avoid tariffs.

00:24We've got very good trade with the US, as we've got very good trade with other countries around the world.

00:29I want to improve on that and, as you will know, I had a meeting with President Trump in September in New York.

00:40I've had a number of phone calls since, including one yesterday.

00:44I won't go into the details of what we discussed, but am I alive to the danger of tariffs?

00:50Yes, of course, I'm against tariffs, but I'm not going to speculate as to what the incoming President might do.

00:57You are committed to introducing or negotiating an SPS, a closer veterinary deal with the EU.

01:04That would probably rule out a grand bargain through trade deal with the United States

01:08because we couldn't include something on agriculture in such a bargain.

01:11How are you going to put the two deals together, with Europe on the one hand and the United States on the other?

01:16Well, I think that we can pursue both.

01:20I don't accept the argument that you've got to either be with the US or be with the EU.

01:27That isn't how it works at the moment with our current trade.

01:30We do want a closer relationship with the EU on security, on defence, on energy and, yes, on trade.

01:37And I've set out how we want to reset on a number of occasions.

01:41At the same time, I want to improve our trading relationships with the US.

01:45Is that going to be easy? Of course it's not.

01:47Do I think we can make progress? Yes, I do.

01:50And that's among the reasons that I'm making sure we've got a good relationship with the incoming president

01:58and that the relationship between our two countries remains as strong in the future as it has been in the past.

Category

Transcript

Comments

Recommended