UK will allay Trump concerns over Chagos Islands, says minister, after Farage claims there is ‘hostility’ to deal – UK politics live | Politics

‘We are where we are’ – minister plays down prospect of UK realigning with EU standards to boost trade

Helena Horton

Speaking at the Agricultural Industries Confederation conference this morning, Daniel Zeichner, the farming minister, said the government will not change the plan to subject some farms to inheritance tax.

Thousands of people plan to descend on Westminster next week in a protest against the changes which they say will cause family farms to be sold off to pay inheritance tax bills. Amazon Prime star Jeremy Clarkson is due to speak at the event as are some political figures yet to be confirmed.

“We are not going to see any change to the budget,” Zeichner said.

But he also said the government was looking into why the Treasury’s figures say only 28% of farms will be affected by the new rules, while figures from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs imply 66% could be.

On Bexit and the trade with the EU, Zeichner also played down suggestions that the UK could reduce trade friction by aligning with EU standards. He explained:

This government has said that we want to renegotiate or improve our relationship with our near neighbours, the European Union.

But quite a lot of the regulatory systems we have inherited are now beginning to diverge and just not through choice, but just because time is passing. And I very much appreciate the fact that for exporters that poses potential challenges.

Now, without going over the debate from the past, we are where we are, but I am charged by Keir Starmer with working with others to try and negotiate an improved veterinary agreement, and we will be trying to achieve that.

We must also respect the choice of British people made the referendum. It wasn’t my choice but that choice was made, and there are advantages, as we’ve seen, in terms of the fact that we’ve been able to move much more quickly on precision breeding.

These are from Theo Bertram, a former Labour adviser in No 10 under Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, on social media on Kemi Badenoch’s performance at PMQs.

Badenoch is still learning at PMQs. I am sure she will get better. There was one small rookie error and one major strategic blunder.

The small, rookie error: on the third question, she spoke before she stood up so her first words were missed by the mic. Stand first. Slow down.

The strategic mistake: Starmer wants to paint her as opposing the difficult choices to do the popular things. He baited her twice on this & the second time, she took it.

Starmer: if she’s against those things she should say so

Badenoch: I’m not against any of those things

It’s hard to earn credibility in opposition. It’s reasonable for the Tories to take time to figure out how they will balance the books but in the meantime Badenoch needs a better line when challenged on spending commitments & to resist being baited.

The Labour party is also criticising Badenoch for saying she supports all the budget measures, but not the employers’ national insurance contributions (NICs) rise that funds them. The party issued this statement after PMQs from Ellie Reeves, the Labour chair.

Kemi Badenoch is trying to have her cake and eat it. Labour’s budget is fixing the foundations to deliver on the promise of change.

The Tories want all of the benefits of the budget, yet they voted against it and they have no plan to pay for it.

It’s the same old Tories, they haven’t listened, and they’ve learned nothing. It’s time they told the public where they would find the money to pay for more investment in schools and the NHS.

For the record, this is what Keir Starmer asked Badenoch during PMQs.

We produced a budget which does not increase tax on working people, nothing in the payslip, investing in our NHS, investing in our schools, so every child could go as far as their talent will take them, investing in the houses of the future. If she is against those things, she should say so.

And this is Badenoch’s reply.

I’m not against any of those things, of course not, none of us are against any of those things.

Stephen Doughty, a Foreign Office minister, was replying to Nigel Farage about the Chagos Islands. He said that, if the UK had not negotiated an agreement with Mauritius, “a legally binding decision against the UK [on sovereignty] seemed inevitable”. He said:

I fundamentally disagree with what [Farage] has had to say.

Let me be absolutely clear, this government inherited a situation where the long-term secure operation of this crucial military base [Diego Garcia] was under threat

International courts were reaching judgments. International organizations were taking steps not to undermine Mauritian sovereignty, and this threatened the secure and effective operation of the base.

And, in the absence of a negotiated solution, a legally binding decision against the UK seemed inevitable. This would have threatened the secure and effective operation of the base and that was not sustainable.

He also said that he looked forward to working with the incoming Trump administration and that he was confident that, when they were briefed on the details, they would realise it was not a threat to security.

We’re looking very forward to working with [the incoming Trump administration], and I’m sure that they will be being briefed on the full detail of this deal. And I am confident that the details of this arrangement will allay any concerns.

Here are the main lines from Nigel Farage’s UQ speech on the Chagos Islands.

• Farage, the Reform UK leader, said there was “outright hostility” in the incoming Trump administration to the UK’s deal with Mauritius handing over sovereignty of the Chagos Islands. He explained:

And if you say to me, ‘Well, yes, it’s OK, the United States are fully in favour [of the sovereignty deal],’ really?

I can tell you that the incoming national security adviser, Mike Waltz, has form on this, right back to when [James Cleverly, the then foreign secretary] was doing his best to give away the sovereignty of the Chagos islands. Indeed, he wrote to Secretary of State Blinken at the time. [See 11.51am.]

There is, I can assure you, having been in America last week, knowing also the incoming defense secretary [Pete Hegseth] very well, there is outright hostility to this deal.

Whatever is said about a lease agreement, as we saw with Hong Kong, these agreements can very, very easily be broken.

Diego Garcia was described to me by a senior Trump adviser as the most important island on the planet as far as America was concerned.

So you’re going to outright hostility [to the deal from the Trump administration] …

There is no basis for this agreement to continue what it is, and if you do, you will be at conflict with a country without which we would be defenseless.

• He claimed there was “no legal reason” why the UK had to give sovereignty of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius. He said Mauritius did not have a historic claim to the islands, which are 1,300 miles away, and he said the Internationl Court of Justice’s ruling saying Mauritius should have sovereignty was only advisory.

And by the way, when it comes to the Chagossian people, yes, of course, what happened to them was truly awful. They do not wish to live – they’re unanimous in this – they do not wish to live under Mauritian rule. They want to live under British rule because they actually trust us.

That was a good PMQs for Keir Starmer. He easily saw off the rightwing opposition leader – or, rather, both of them.

The hit on Nigel Farage was the neatest, and the funniest. The Reform UK leader, who on the basis of today’s interventions also doubles up as MP for Mar-a-Lago, not MP for Clacton, asked a perfectly reasonable question about proscribing the IRRG, but Starmer shot him down with a joke. (See 12.30pm.) It was slighly hypocritical, given that Starmer is fast appointing the point where an MP at PMQs is going to welcome the fact that he’s making a rare visit to the UK (a gag told about Tony Blair, when his globetrotting went too far). But the putdown was genuinely funny, and so that did not matter.

In the past Starmer has sometimes seemed a bit wary of treating Farage with disdain in the chamber. But maybe he has decided it is safe to hit him hard after all.

Starmer also won quite comfortably against Kemi Badenoch, although that probably was more to do with her performance, rather than his. PMQs is not easy, and the new Tory leader seems a long way off working out how to use it to embarrass or unsettle the PM. Labour MPs were heckling her at one point for using a script, but there is nothing wrong with having questions written down. What is important, though, it to work out how to use a question, to either lure the PM into a response that will open them up to criticism, or to make their refusal to engage look weak and weasly. Badenoch did not really manage this with any of her questions, and so all we were left with was a broad-brush shouting match. Starmer did best because his payoff line was the more persuasive partly, again, because humour was involved. (See 12.14pm.) Other opposition leaders have used wit to great effect at PMQs, but humour doesn’t seem to be one of Badenoch’s strong points.

Otherwise, PMQs was interesting – or depressing – because it provided fresh evidence that this intake of government backbenchers is worse than previous ones when it comes to asking soft, planted questions. Here is my colleague Peter Walker making this point.

Two thoughts on #PMQs. Felt like another win for Starmer. It takes time to get the hang of it & Badenoch still felt a bit unfocused (& slightly patronising). Also, while planting obsequious questions with governing party backbenchers isn’t new, under Labour they are *ubiquitous*.

Kate McCann from Times Radio noticed this too.

One of the worst PMQs sessions I’ve been to in some time. Lots of planted questions, no real answers… MPs also voting with their feet and leaving early. Definitely less packed than in recent weeks.

As an MP, if you had the opportunity to ask the PM a question why would you read out something handed to you by whips? (A planted question). There must be hundreds of issues and awful cases raised by constituents – have always thought it’s such a waste.

In the Commons Stephen Doughty, a Foreign Office minister, is now responding to the urgent question on the Chagos Islands. It was tabled by Nigel Farage, the Reform UK leader, and he said that from his time in the US last week, talking to Donald Trump’s team, he says they regard the deal with Mauritius, giving it sovereignty of the Chagos Islands, with “outright hostility”.

He says Diego Garcia, the main island in the Chagos Island and the home of a UK/US military base, was described to him as “the most imporant island on the planet” for US security. He claimed the deal would pose a threat to its future.

I will post more from the UQ after my PMQs snap verdict.

Alec Shelbrooke (Con) says the assisted dying bill will be one of the most consequential pieces of legislation considered by MPs. He is worried about the short period of time set aside for the debate. Will the PM commit to giving the Commons two days to debate the bill on the floor of the house at report stage – “16 hours of protected time’” – so the issues can be considered in full.

He says, without that assurance, “people like myself may decline a second reading over fear that we may not get to debate these issues in full”.

Starmer says it will be a free vote. Every MP needs to decide how they will vote. He says he thinks “sufficient time” has been allocated to the bill.

And that is the end of PMQs.

Jo White (Lab) asks if the government will continue to smash the people smuggling gangs.

Yes, says Starmer. He says the government has returned 9,400 people with no right to be here. He goes on:

They talked about getting the flights off. We’ve got the flights off deportation flight. And so that’s why we’re investing another £75m pounds in the smashing the gangs.

We’re absolutely determined to give a serious response for a serious question, not a gimmick that achieved absolutely nothing.

Alex Brewer (Lib Dem) asks about chalkstream rivers in her constituency, and how to protect them from river pollution.

Starmer says the government has taken immediate action to improve water quality, including setting up a water commission.

James McMurdock (Reform UK) asks about the interest rate councils have to pay for borrowing. He asks for it to be cut.

Starmer says the government has decided to cut a premium borrowing fee imposed on councils.

Juliet Campbell (Lab) asks about flood prevention in Broxtowe.

Starmer says the last government left flood defences in their worst state on record. This goverment is increasing investment in them, he says.

Nigel Farage (Reform UK) says the PM will want to congratulate Donald Trump on his victory last week.

(Starmer did – last week)

Farage goes on. Will the UK proscribe the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, which would mend fences with the Trump administration “given that the whole of his cabinet have been so rude about him over the last few year”.

Starmer starts with a joke.

I’m glad to see the honorable member making a rare appearance back here. He’s spent so much time in America recently I was half expecting to see all the immigration statistics.

He goes on to say Farage has made a serious point about Iran.