\n\t\t\t\t\tThe hope is that a UK deal could be low-hanging fruit for Trump. But the waiting game goes on\t\t\t\t\t <\/p>\n
On Friday, Rachel Reeves<\/a> finally received the news of her dreams \u2013 economic growth. After months of recession warnings, new GDP figures show that the economy expanded by a whole 0.5 per cent in February. While it\u2019s still fairly small fry, it beats the gloomy forecasts from economists \u2013 and is fuelling hope in Whitehall that some of ministers\u2019 rhetoric on growth may finally be cutting through.<\/p>\n The question \u2013 is that progress about to be wiped out by the orange man on the other side of the pond? This was the week that the US president blinked. After promising a hard rain with his Liberation Day tariffs<\/a>, Trump paused a wave of tariffs for 90 days as he said he wanted to focus on China. For Wall Street the decision brought some brief relief. <\/p>\n Yet while some plans for escalation are now on hold, the global trade war is still in full swing<\/a>. The 10 per cent tariffs slapped on the UK remain and some in government worry they could stay in place even if they manage to agree a trade deal with the US. Talks around a trade deal are of increasing urgency. <\/p>\n The view of ministers is that Team Trump<\/a> may want a win after a tricky week \u2013 so while the UK is not the largest trading partner, an easy deal could be seen as low hanging fruit. Much of the work has already been done \u2013 with negotiating talks going on for months, building on the Tories\u2019 work when in government. \u201cWe just don\u2019t know if it will happen,\u201d says a government figure. \u201cIt could be quick \u2013 or could take a long time.\u201d<\/p>\n No wonder then that MPs are getting a sense of d\u00e9j\u00e0 vu. \u201cWe\u2019re back to Brexit<\/a>,\u201d says one Labour MP. \u201cIt\u2019s \u2018will they, won\u2019t they\u2019 on a deal \u2013 and we don\u2019t have many cards to play.\u201d Long term Whitehall figures worry there may be an optimism bias in favour of a deal being done. They point to the fact the US has always stated regulatory independence \u2013 outside the EU\u2019s orbit<\/a> \u2013 as key to any negotiations. How does that fit with the UK\u2019s plan for closer relations with Brussels and the summit next month? <\/p>\n Expect Whitehall veterans and some Labour figures to make the case that Trump is too unpredictable and it is time to hug the EU close. Now some of these are the pro-EU die hards. But senior Labour figures are urging Downing Street to grasp the nettle and make decisions that show the UK is in control. \u201cAt the moment we are big on rhetoric and light on action,\u201d says a senior party figure.<\/p>\n Right now ministers are pushing a line on immigration that is sceptical about new arrivals and of the view that numbers should come down. Yet with the government allegedly all in for growth, is there an opportunity to attract all the top technologists and top scientists who are either being pushed out of the USA because of immigration issues or unhappiness with government cuts? <\/p>\n Large reductions in government funding in the US means that many top scientists are looking for jobs. There\u2019s already been a MAGA debate over immigrants in Silicon Valley. Next, foreign students. The UK could also relax its own rules about foreign students to both help universities raise cash and attract talent. But they may be worried about headlines on immigration.\u00a0<\/p>\n Then there\u2019s China. Beijing is likely to dump a huge amount of goods on the rest of the world that it can no longer export to the States. The risk is that this depresses the profitability of all British producers. So ministers could bring in anti-dumping provisions. <\/p>\n In Downing Street, there is a reluctance to look as though they are moving too closely to the EU. \u201cMorgan is allergic to it,\u201d says a Starmer ally of the prospect of closer relations. Yet as the EU moves away from America, they may be more inclined to work with Britain. Starmer\u2019s challenge is to avoid isolating America in the process.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The hope is that a UK deal could be low-hanging fruit for Trump. But the waiting game goes…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":14480,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5226],"tags":[802,748,2000,299,5187,1699,4884,619,479,1757,16,10051,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-14479","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-brexit","8":"tag-brexit","9":"tag-britain","10":"tag-eu","11":"tag-europe","12":"tag-european","13":"tag-european-union","14":"tag-great-britain","15":"tag-rachel-reeves","16":"tag-tariffs","17":"tag-trump","18":"tag-uk","19":"tag-uk-economy","20":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114326525884436635","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14479","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14479"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14479\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14480"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14479"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14479"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14479"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}