Nigel Farage will not be used as an envoy to build bridges with Donald Trump, a Cabinet minister made clear, jibing: “Hasn’t he got a job to do in Clacton”.
The Reform UK leader, a longtime supporter of the president-elect, has offered to help the UK avoid tariffs that Trump is threatening to impose on imports into America.
Mr Farage, who was praised by Trump when he attended a rally in Pennsylvania as America prepared to vote on Tuesday, has said that he would be “glad to assist” in “bridging the divide that exists between Starmer’s Government and Trump”.
“Britain is really going to have to roll out the red carpet for Trump very quickly. If we don’t, a great opportunity will be squandered,” said Clacton MP Mr Farage.
The British government has been seeking to build ties with the Trump team, including through the UK’s ambassador in Washington Dame Karen Pierce, and Sir Keir Starmer and Foreign Secretary David Lammy met Trump in September for dinner.
Mr Lammy is one of a number of Labour Cabinet ministers who have previously torn into Trump, with the now Foreign Secretary having described him in a tweet in 2018 as a “woman-hating Neo-Nazi sympathising sociopath”.
Asked on ITV’s Good Morning Britain whether the new Labour government would take up Mr Farage’s offer, Cabinet Office minister Pat McFadden said: “Hasn’t he got a job working for the people of Clacton that he was recently elected to a few months ago?
“We do have a strong relationship and we want to keep that and that is why the Prime Minister spoke to the president elect last night.
“We have got an excellent ambassador working for us in the United States at the moment.
“We know that being an ally of the United States, standing with the United States, being a friend of the United States is in Britain’s interests and the two of us acting together is in the interest of the world too.”
Mr Farage claimed ahead of the US election that “a Trump win will make the world a safer place” despite concerns on both sides of the Atlantic over past threats by the Republican to pull the US away from Nato and his apparent plan to cut support for Ukraine as it battles Vladimir Putin’s invasion.
