Labour’s Emily Thornberry backs calls for king’s state visit to US to be postponed given Iran war and US rift with its allies
Good morning. Keir Starmer is chairing cabinet this morning, and government business is still dominated by foreign policy. Yvette Cooper, the foreign secretary, is in the Commons later where she will give an update on the UK’s response to the US-Israeli war against Iran, doubtless firming up the line set out by Starmer yesterday.
And Starmer himself is meeting Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the Ukrainian president, and Mark Rutte, the Nato secretary general.
European leaders are not enthusiastic about fighting Tehran, but they are very committed to supporting Ukraine, and alarmed that about the only country that has gained from the Iran war at no cost is Russia. This is bound to come up this afternoon.
Starmer has largely resisted the temptation to hit back at Trump’s endless provocations, which escalated yesterday when the president accused the PM of dithering and being over-reliant on his advisers. But this morning Starmer is being encouraged to engage in some soft power retaliation – by cancelling the king’s state visit to the US planned for next month.
Until now calling for the state visit to be postponed has primarily been an Ed Davey obsession – and once an idea becomes a Lib Dem policy, the chances of Starmer endorsing it tend to plummet. But this morning Emily Thornberry, the chair of the Commons foreign affairs committee, also endorsed the idea, which means it has a toehold in Labour mainstream thinking, and makes it a bit more credible as a potential option.
In an interview on the Today programme, asked if she favoured postponing the visit, Thornberry said:
If it was to go ahead next month – the dates haven’t been confirmed, but everybody seems to think it’s going to be next month – it would go ahead against a backdrop of a war and that, I think, is quite difficult. The last thing that we want to do is to have Their Majesties embarrassed.
The visit is meant to be taking place at the end of April. It is possible, of course, that the war could be over by then, but there is no guarantee of that, given that Trump does not seem have have an exit strategy, and the Iranian regime is intact and committed to keeping the fight going.
In the inteview Thornberry went on:
I think it needs to be thought through very carefully as to whether or not it’s appropriate to go ahead now, or maybe have a limited program, or delay it. But we can’t just pretend that there isn’t a background of war.
When pressed as to what she thought should happen, Thornberry said:
I suspect it would be safer to delay it, but I don’t know the details.
Here is the agenda for the day.
9.30am: Keir Starmer chairs a meeting of the cabinet, including a political cabinet.
Morning: Kemi Badenoch is on a visit in east Surrey.
11am: Nigel Farage, the Reform UK leader, and Robert Jenrick, his Treasury spokesperson, hold a press conference. As the BBC reports, they are going to proposing getting rid of VAT and green levies on energy bills – as well as announcing a lottery prize draw, open to anyone, with Reform UK paying energy bills for the winner, and their whole street, for a year.
11.30am: David Lammy, the deputy PM and justice secretary, takes questions in the Commons.
Noon: Downing Street holds a lobby briefing.
After 12.30pm: Yvette Cooper, the foreign secretary, makes a statement to MPs about the US-Israel war against Iran.
1.30pm: Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, delivers the Mais lecture. As Graeme Wearden reports on his business live blog, she will identify innovation and AI, closer ties with Europe, and regional growth as three big opportunities for economic growth in the UK.
Afternoon: Starmer meets Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the Ukrainian president, in Downing Street. Starmer is also meeting Mark Rutte, the Nato secretary general.
Afternoon: MPs debate all stages of the ministerial salaries (amendment) bill, which will increase the number of government ministers who can be paid a salary from 109 (the limit set in an act passed in 1975) to 120.
3.40pm: Lisa Nandy, the culture secretary, gives a speech at the Society of Editors conference.
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