Fresh questions were asked about
Downing Street
‘s sense of direction under Sir
Keir Starmer
today – after bungling officials gave the wrong location for the PM’s press conference.
The gaffe meant journalists were forced into a last-ditch scramble to get to the correct venue in order to quiz Sir Keir about his trade deal with
Donald Trump
.
The mix-up by No10 staff came after they confused the Jaguar Land Rover plant in Coventry with the car-maker’s factory in Solihull – some 34 miles away.
Sir Keir was actually attending the Solihull facility, where he spoke by phone to the US President to announce a trade agreement.
It meant political reporters, who had followed No10’s instructions and travelled from
London
to the Coventry plant, had to make a last-minute alteration to their journeys.
It prompted further suggestions that Downing Street had been taken by surprise by the speed with which Mr Trump was announcing the US-UK trade deal.
Sir Keir’s day had previously been earmarked for VE Day commemorations.
Theo Usherwood, Times Radio’s political correspondent, was forced explained to listeners why he was reporting from a taxi this afternoon.
‘I’m in a cab, because No10 sent us to the wrong address,’ he said.
He added: ‘They sent us to a car manufacturing plant in Coventry when, in actual fact, we’re meant at one half an hour away up the road in Solihull.’
Usherwood said it ‘speaks to the fact that this has been a very hastily-arranged press call’.
‘The PM bounced into it by the President who is eager to prove to Americans he has it all in hand and he is signing trade deals off at a rate of knots,’ he added.
Speaking to Sir Keir from the White House this afternoon, Mr Trump said the agreement would be ‘really good’ for both sides.
The US President boasted the bond between the US and UK will be ‘stronger than ever before’.
‘I want to thank Prime Minister Starmer,’ he added. ‘He’s been terrific for his partnership in this matter.
‘It’s really an external and an internal bond between our two countries. It will soon be stronger than ever before. We have a great relationship.
‘I want to just say that the representatives of UK have been so professional, and it’s been an honour doing business with all of them, and in particular the Prime Minister.’
The US-UK trade deal is a ‘fantastic, historic day’ for the two countries, Sir Keir said, adding it was ‘apt’ it was signed on VE Day.
The PM told Mr Trump: ‘This is a really fantastic historic day in which we can announce this deal between our two great countries, and I think it’s a real tribute to the history that we have of working so closely together.’
‘This is going to boost trade between and across our countries.
‘It’s going to not only protect jobs, but create jobs, opening market access, and as you say, Donald, the timing couldn’t be more apt.
‘Because not only was it 80 years ago today that victory came for Europe after and at the end of the Second World War, but of course on that the UK and the US stood together as the closest of allies.’
Read more