Rolling coverage of all the day’s political developments as they happen
9.09am GMT
Westminster is still trying to come to terms with the election of Donald Trump as American president. Theresa May will set out some of her thinking in her Mansion House speech this evening, previewed here, but the Times and the Daily Telegraph are both splashing on reports saying some Tories are unhappy about May’s decision to rule out using the Ukip leader Nigel Farage as an intermediary. Both papers quote what Lord Marland, a Tory peer and former minister and former government trade envoy, told Radio 5 Live yesterday.
Anything we can do at any level to rebuild that relationship [with the US] will be to Britain’s advantage, and if Mr Farage happens to be one of the people who encourages that relationship then so be it. Any manufacturer would use its best salesman to try and help get a market for them and if No 10 decides that that’s the person, then fine.
Monday’s Times front page:
Tories split over Farage role in deal with Trump#tomorrowspaperstoday #bbcpapers http://pic.twitter.com/vJUD4txTN5
Monday’s Telegraph front page:
May under fire for dismissing Farage’s alliance with Trump#tomorrowspaperstoday #bbcpapers http://pic.twitter.com/vDMtxQEXGz
We talked to all of the key players in Trump’s team and it’s perfectly clear that to a man and woman they are anglophiles. We talked about the prospect of the United Kingdom being at the front of the queue, all of which was met positively.
The only slight negative I picked up was the sense that so many senior Conservative figures and indeed important staff figures who now work in No 10 had been so unrelentingly negative about The Donald. Clearly, there are fences to be mended.
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Sig Nordal 