We will fight Trump’s plans to slap tariffs on the UK – Rachel Reeves

Rachel Reeves’s first Mansion House speech will put the British government on a collision course with the incoming US administration. Photograph: Tayfun Salcı/Rex/Shutterstock

The chancellor Rachel Reeves will use a keynote speech this week to promote free and open trade between nations as a cornerstone of UK economic policy, putting the Labour government on direct collision course with president-elect Donald Trump.

Reeves will use her first speech at the Mansion House – an annual showpiece for the chancellor – to outline a post-budget plan to “go for growth”. But as the UK government scrambles to respond to Trump’s emphatic victory, and the challenges it poses for Britain on vital issues of economic and foreign policy, the chancellor is expected to be clear that she will take the fight to Washington in defence of free trade.