JD Vance claims he was not referring to Britain or France in jibe about European troops – UK politics live | Politics

Kemi Badenoch has defended JD Vance over his comment about “20,000 troops from some random country that has not fought a war in 30 or 40 years” not being able to provide a good security guarantee for Ukraine. (See 10.36am.) Even though her shadow defence secretary, James Cartlidge, said the comments were “deeply disrespectful” because he was confident that Vance was referring to Britain and France (the two countries that have taken the lead in saying they would provide troops), Badenoch said Vance was being misinterpreted.

Asked for a reaction to Vance suggesting that Britain was just a “random country”, she told GB News:

Well, I know JD Vance quite well. I’ve looked at the comments. I don’t think he actually said that.

A lot of people are getting carried away. They’re saying loads of things and getting quite animated. Let’s keep cool heads.

America is our closest ally, and I believe the President Trump and JD Vance want peace. They’re looking after their national interest. We need to do so.

Asked if she thought Vance was talking about France, not Britain, Badenoch said she was “not getting into that speculation” and ended the interview.

Badenoch met Vance for dinner when she visited Washington in December. They had previously met before, when she was business secretary and he was a senator, and it is understood they keep in touch and exchange regular text messages.

No 10 plays down significance of Trump halting aid for Ukraine, saying UK and US ‘on same page’ in wanting secure peace

Pippa Crerar

Keir Starmer said he was going to stick to his Ukraine peace strategy when he spoke to his cabinet this morning. And he seems determined to avoid being “derailed” (as Angela Rayner put it – see 9.12am) by President Trump halting military aid to Ukraine. This is what the PM’s spokesperson said in his readout of Starmer’s Ukraine comments at cabinet.

The US is an indispensable ally of the UK, and our two countries are deeply intertwined when it comes to security, intelligence and defence, as well as trade and investment, and [the PM] was pleased to have agreed with President Trump to work at pace on a new economic deal focused on AI and tech.

He had spoken to President Trump twice over the weekend and again last night, in addition to the conversations he had had with President Zelenskyy, President Macron and other leaders in recent days.

The prime minister emphasised that everyone was aligned in pursuit of a plan that will bring lasting and durable peace to Ukraine.

The prime minister was clear that such a peace would need to be backed by strong security guarantees, including a “coalition of the willing” of those ready to defend and guarantee the peace, with US backing to deter Putin from returning. And any deal must be based on a strong, sovereign, and secure Ukraine.

He said he would continue to have conversations at pace and reiterated the importance of this work for British security.

During the lobby briefing, the PM’s spokesperson played down suggestions that No 10 was “ambushed” by President Trump’s decision last night. (A few hours earlier, Starmer told MPs that he did not expect the US to cut off military aid for Ukraine – see 9.12am.) “Things are moving at pace, and there are discussions happening every day in terms of progressing towards the outcome that we all want to see in relation to a durable peace in Ukraine,” the spokesperson said. But he also insisted:

We’re all on the same page in relation to what we want to achieve, which is a secure and durable peace.

Asked if the government was disappointed by Trump’s decision, the spokesperson said that the UK and the US were “completely aligned” in wanting a “secure and durable peace”.

The i is reporting that countries like countries like Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Bahrain, could be asked to contribute to the Europe-led force that could protect Ukraine as part of any peace deal. Asked about the claim, the spokesperson said other countries would be free to join the “coalition of the willing”, but he would not say if Middle Eastern countries were actively being encouraged to participate.

Downing Street has praised the record of British troops, pointing out that they have fought and died alongside American allies.

Asked to respond to JD Vance’s comment about a European force protecting Ukraine (widely seen as a reference to the British and the French – although Vance himself insists that he was not talking about these two countries), the PM’s spokesperson said:

The prime minister, and I think this whole country, is full of admiration for all British troops who have served, for instance, in Iraq and Afghanistan, many of whom have lost their lives in the process, and have fought, obviously, alongside allies, including the United States.

It’s very clear that their courage and bravery has helped to ensure global security, defend our values, defend our national interests. Our focus, once again, is on how we protect our national interests and global security by progressing the discussions to secure a lasting peace for Ukraine.

Keir Starmer spoke to Donald Trump on Monday night, Downing Street has revealed.

As PA Media reports, it is not clear whether the call was before or after the US president paused military aid to Ukraine.

No 10 would not comment directly on the pause without seeing the details of the announcement and did not say whether Starmer had been given any guidance from the US before the move.

JD Vance, the US vice president, has claimed that he was not referring to Britain or France when he said that a minerals deal with the US, giving America an economic stake in Ukraine, would provide “a way better security guarantee than 20,000 troops from some random country that has not fought a war in 30 or 40 years”. (See 10.36am.). He posted this reponse to a post from the Italian journalist Antonello Guerrara saying he must have been referring to British and French peacekeepers.

This is absurdly dishonest.

I don’t even mention the UK or France in the clip, both of whom have fought bravely alongside the US over the last 20 years, and beyond.

And he added this.

But let’s be direct: there are many countries who are volunteering (privately or publicly) support who have neither the battlefield experience nor the military equipment to do anything meaningful.

Vance is right to say that many European countries could not field a sizeable military force with battlefield experience.

But, given that Britain and France are the two countries that have taken the lead in saying they are willing to put troops on the ground, it is easy to see why people think he was referring to them when he talked about “20,000 troops from some random country”. Last month it was reported that Emmanuel Macron and Keir Starmer were working on a plan for Europe to deploy around 30,000 troops to protect Ukraine.

BBC director general Tim Davie said he is “not ruling anything out” when asked if a documentary on Gaza which featured the son of a Hamas official could return to iPlayer, PA Media reports. In a story on Davie’s evidence to the Commons culture committere this morning, PA says:

The corporation removed the documentary Gaza: How To Survive A Warzone from the BBC’s on demand service after it emerged that the child narrator is the son of Ayman Alyazouri, who has worked as Hamas’s deputy minister of agriculture.

The broadcaster apologised last week for “serious flaws” in the making of the programme after conducting an initial review and it has launched a further internal probe.

Appearing before the culture committee, Davie said: “As editor-in-chief, I have to be secured, not only editorially where the film’s at, but the making of that film. And at that point, quite quickly, I lost trust in that film. Therefore I have taken the decision, took the decision quite quickly, to take it off iPlayer while we do this deep dive.”

Questioned whether it could return to iPlayer, the BBC boss said he is “not ruling anything out” but he wants “forensic analysis” to be carried out on the programme on various areas including its budget.

Davie added that he is aware of a “small payment” being made to the sister of the son of the Hamas official who featured in the documentary for his part in recording the narration.

Following an initial review, a BBC spokesperson said last week that the broadcaster had “no plans to broadcast the programme again in its current form or return it to iPlayer” and that it would make a “further assessment” once the review is complete.

In a letter to the BBC on Monday, Ofcom chairman Lord Grade said the regulator could step in if an internal inquiry into the making of the documentary is not satisfactory. Grade said Ofcom has “ongoing concerns about the nature and gravity of these failings and the negative impact they have on the trust audiences place in the BBC’s journalism”.

During the committee session, Davie said there is “a lot of frustration and disappointment” that the Gaza documentary has affected public trust in the corporation.

He said: “I’d say nothing’s more important than we’re trusted and we have actually built trust… so you can imagine that there’s a lot of frustration and disappointment. It’s not about the BBC and people like myself, but we’re very sorry to the audience, because we don’t want to be in a position where we have flaws in the programme-making.

“And overall, I am proud of the way we’re covering some of these polarised, fiendishly difficult events where many of our journalists, as you know, are under enormous pressure, ferocious lobbying, and it’s been extremely difficult.”

However, he acknowledged that there were “flaws” with the documentary and said the BBC has had around 500 complaints about the film being biased against Israel, and around 1,800 which wanted the film put back on iPlayer.

James Cartlidge, the shadow defence secretary, has accused JD Vance of being “deeply disrespectful” to the British and French military. Referring to the vice-president’s comments disparaging a potential Europe-led force protecting Ukraine (see 10.36am), Cartlidge said:

Nato article 5 has been invoked once – on 12/9/01 by the USA, after 9/11. Britain and France came to their aid deploying 1,000s of personnel to Afghanistan, including numerous parliamentary colleagues, past & present. It’s deeply disrespectful to ignore such service and sacrifice.

Johnny Mercer, the former Tory veterans minister, has called JD Vance a “clown” in his response to the vice president’s comment about a Europe-led force protecting Ukraine. (See 10.36am.) Mercer said:

This clown needs to check his privilege. I read @JDVance book making the mistake of finding him quite interesting. By his own admission he spent his time in the Marines “writing articles and taking pictures”.

Perhaps if he had got his hands dirty serving his country like so many of his fellow American and British veterans, chasing his own country’s crazy foreign policy ideas, he might not be so quick to dismiss their sacrifice.

The Conservative party has said that it does not agree with the Tory MP Graham Stuart who has said President Trump might be a “Russian asset”. (See 9.12am.) A party spokesperson said:

Personal views of individual MPs are not official Conservative party positions.

It is imperative that the UK remains close to America, and engages with them, if we are going to get a just and lasting peace for Ukraine.

The SNP has criticised President Trump’s decision to suspend military aid to Ukraine. This is from Stephen Gethins, the party’s foreign affairs spokesperson.

Ukraine is fighting a war for its very existence and the survival of its citizens. Ukrainians know that any Russian advantages in the battlefield will result in devastating consequences for innocent Ukrainians.

That is why it is right to give Ukraine the means of defending itself against Russia’s aggression. This suspension is wrong and highlights once again the need for the UK government and Europe’s democracies to work even more closely together on Ukraine and our mutual security.

The Liberal Democrats are saying JD Vance must apologise for his comment about the value of a European-led peacekeeeping force in Ukraine, which is being interpreted as a slur against the British army. (See 10.36am.) This is from Helen Maguire, the Lib Dems’ defence spokesperson and a former captain in the Royal Military Police who served in Iraq.

JD Vance is erasing from history the hundreds of British troops who gave their lives in Iraq and Afghanistan.

I saw firsthand how American and British soldiers fought bravely together shoulder to shoulder. Six of my own regiment, the Royal Military Police, didn’t return home from Iraq. This is a sinister attempt to deny that reality.

As the UK’s representative to the US, Peter Mandelson should call on Vance to apologise for these comments.

Agency workers will reportedly be included in a ban on “exploitative” zero-hours contracts as part of changes to the UK government’s employment bill, Julia Kollewe reports.