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No 10 says Trump was ‘wrong to diminish role’ played by British troops in Afghanistan
Downing Street has said that Donald Trump was “wrong” to downplay the role played by British troops in Afghanistan.
Asked about the comments at this morning’s lobby briefing, the PM’s spokesperson said:
The president was wrong to diminish the role of Nato troops, including British forces, in Afghanistan following the 9/11 attacks on the US.
Article 5 of the Nato treaty was invoked for the first time and British forces served alongside American and other allied troops in sustained combat operations.
457 British service personnel lost their lives in Afghanistan and many more were wounded. Many hundreds suffered life-changing injuries from their service alongside the US and our allies in Afghanistan.
Their sacrifice and that of other Nato forces was made in the service of collective security and in response to an attack on our ally.
We are incredibly proud of our armed forces and their service and sacrifice will never be forgotten.
But the spokesperson did not back calls for the president to apologise and, asked if Keir Starmer would be raising this with Trump when they next speak (as Stephen Kinnock suggested this morning – see 8.56am), the spokesperson just said that details of any calls would be set out in the normal way.
And there seem to be no plans to haul in the US ambassador, as the Liberal Democrats are proposing. (See 11.28am.)
Key events
The SNP has said that Keir Starmer will be “acting like some kind of tin-pot dictator” if he blocks Andy Burnham from being a candidate in the Gorton and Denton byelection. (See 11.05am.) In a statement, Pete Wishart, the SNP’s deputy leader at Westminster, said:
It reeks of desperation that the prime minister is having to stitch up a selection process to cling onto power – and underlines the chaos in the bitterly divided Labour party.
Conservative councillors from around the country have told PoliticsHome that they have been offered senior council roles, or selection as parliamentary candidates, if they defect to Reform UK. In her story, Matilda Martin quotes several councillors who have been on the receiving end of these offers, and she also quotes John Cope, chair of the Conservative Councillors’ Association, who told her:
Councillors across the country have reported being approached with offers of funding, roles, and cabinet positions if they join Reform. The running joke is that more parliamentary seats have been promised than actually exist.
Reform UK told Martin that it was not paying anyone to defect, and that no one in the party could guarantee that someone would be selected as a Reform parliamentary candidate.
Adam Price, the Danish screenwriter who wrote Borgen, the drama about a Danish PM, has written an article for the Guardian about the Greenland crisis. This is what he says about Donald Trump’s comments about Nato allies.
It is bizarre how accustomed we have become to a US president who openly lies, distorts facts and is utterly ignorant about history. (Leaving aside that he confused Iceland with Greenland in his speech.) Trump claimed that Europeans alone benefit from Nato and said he doubted anyone would come to the aid of the US. Yet the only country that has ever called for help invoking Nato’s Article 5 is the US after 9/11. Europe immediately responded. Denmark, along with the UK and other Nato allies, sent troops to Afghanistan. Denmark lost more soldiers per head than any other country in the coalition apart from the US. How utterly insulting for the families, still mourning their dead, to hear the ingratitude of a US president so ignorant of their loss.
And here is the full article.
A reader BTL has been asking what Nigel Farage has been saying about Donald Trump’s Afghanistan comments. It is not often that readers are asking for more Farage but, since the question has been posed, Farage has decided to speak out this morning on his social media feed – about his record supporting businesses in Clacton. He has not said anything on that platform (or anywhere else, it appears) about the latest statement from his US friend.
Farage did criticise Trump on Wednesday, saying that the US president was being “not quite fair” when he said America had not got anything back from Nato. Farage said that countries like Britain and Denmark had lost the same number of troops per head of population as the US in the wars since 9/11. But Trump’s latest comment is markedly more offensive, and Farage has not yet addressed it.
The Conservative peer and diehard Brexiter Daniel Hannan has joined those criticising Donald Trump over his Afghanistan comments. He posted this on social media last night, and this a few hours ago.
Our problem now is not TDS; it’s TD.
TDS is Trump derangement syndrome, a term used by the rightwingers in the US to suggest that Trump’s critics are obsessive and wrong. Hannan seems to be saying the president really is deranged.
Shabana Mahmood to unveil plans drastically cut number of police forces in England and Wales
Major policing reforms expected to drastically cut the number of forces across England and Wales would be “complex to deliver” and risk separating police forces from communities they serve, a policing body has warned. PA Media says:
Shabana Mahmood, the home secretary, is poised to unveil the largest overhaul of policing in decades on Monday, in an effort to tackle what government sources called “an epidemic of everyday offences”.
The changes will see the overall number of forces slashed from their current level of 43, and tasked with focusing on serious and organised crime along with complex investigations such as homicides.
At the lower level, each town, city and borough will be formed into a “local policing area” – with neighbourhood officers focused on local crime such as shoplifting and anti-social behaviour.
Mahmood has previously said that the structure of 43 forces in England and Wales is “irrational”, and police chiefs have already called for radical reform of the set-up, backing a system with fewer, larger forces.
But reacting to the expected move, the Association of Police and Crime Commissioners (APCC) said the creation of regional forces would be expensive, time consuming and has the potential to “derail” the ambition of reforms.
PCCs Matthew Scott and Clare Moody said: “The public want neighbourhood policing. There is no evidence to suggest the public would welcome bigger forces and in terms of public accountability, it also risks creating a separation between police forces and the local communities they serve.
“It makes responding to local policing and crime needs more difficult and removes the link between local taxpayers and the police they increasingly directly fund through the policing precept.”
They added financial savings from creating larger force areas “could be outweighed by very significant set-up costs”.
Mahmood is understood to believe the current system, which sees each of the 43 forces pay for separate headquarters and administrative staff, wastes money that could be spent on fighting crime.
Sources said the reforms would save money by merging back-office functions, freeing up resources to be invested in more police officers.
The changes are also intended to even out differences in performance between police forces, with ministers believing smaller forces lack the resources to tackle major incidents.
A government source pointed to Wiltshire police, which needed support from 40 other forces to respond to the Salisbury poisonings in 2018, as well as vast differences in charge rates for some offences.
They said: “Under this new structure, all forces – regardless of where they are – will have the tools and resources they need to fight serious crime. Where you live will no longer determine the outcomes you get from your force.”
But the changes will take time to come into effect, with the mergers only expected to be completed by the end of the next parliament in the mid-2030s.
No 10 says Trump was ‘wrong to diminish role’ played by British troops in Afghanistan
Downing Street has said that Donald Trump was “wrong” to downplay the role played by British troops in Afghanistan.
Asked about the comments at this morning’s lobby briefing, the PM’s spokesperson said:
The president was wrong to diminish the role of Nato troops, including British forces, in Afghanistan following the 9/11 attacks on the US.
Article 5 of the Nato treaty was invoked for the first time and British forces served alongside American and other allied troops in sustained combat operations.
457 British service personnel lost their lives in Afghanistan and many more were wounded. Many hundreds suffered life-changing injuries from their service alongside the US and our allies in Afghanistan.
Their sacrifice and that of other Nato forces was made in the service of collective security and in response to an attack on our ally.
We are incredibly proud of our armed forces and their service and sacrifice will never be forgotten.
But the spokesperson did not back calls for the president to apologise and, asked if Keir Starmer would be raising this with Trump when they next speak (as Stephen Kinnock suggested this morning – see 8.56am), the spokesperson just said that details of any calls would be set out in the normal way.
And there seem to be no plans to haul in the US ambassador, as the Liberal Democrats are proposing. (See 11.28am.)
Donald Trump’s latest comments outraging British public opinion are a problem for Nigel Farage. Farage has spent the last 10 years boasting about his friendship with Trump, the two leaders are ideologically aligned and Reform UK has made clear that, in some respects at least, it would model itself on what the Trump administration has done if it formed a government.
But being associated with Trump is a problem. According to a report by Bethany Dawson for Politico about the findings from a focus group in Stevenage featuring women who are considering switching from Labour to Reform UK, “concern about Farage’s relationship with Donald Trump is rife”. Dawson says:
Wider polling by More in Common, the think tank which organized the focus group held on Monday night, found 25 percent of women see Farage’s support for Trump as the top reason not to vote Reform. That compared to 21 percent of the men surveyed between Jan. 10 and 13.
US ambassador should be summoned for reprimand over Trump’s comments, Lib Dems say
The US ambassador should be summoned to the Foreign Office for a reprimand over Donald Trump’s comments, the Liberal Democrats are saying. James MacCleary, the Lib Dem defence spokesperson, said:
Trump’s lies about the British soldiers who laid down their lives in Afghanistan are disgraceful. The president shows his true colours in denigrating the best of us – those who gave the ultimate sacrifice.
Keir Starmer must summon the US ambassador over this insult to our brave troops.
Defence secretary John Healey delivers implicit rebuke to Trump, saying more than 450 British ‘heroes’ died in Afghanistan
John Healey, the defence secretary, has posted a message on social media that amounts to an implicit rebuke to Donald Trump over his comments about the contribution made by Nato allies in Afghanistan. Healey said:
NATO’s Article 5 has only been triggered once. The UK and NATO allies answered the US call. And more than 450 British personnel lost their lives in Afghanistan.
Those British troops should be remembered for who they were: heroes who gave their lives in service of our nation.
By comparison with some of the comments made by other parliamentarians today, this is very mild. But in government circles (almost regardless of which party is in power) there is always a strong reluctance to disagree with the US government in public.
Letting Labour HQ rig candidate selection in Manchester byelection would be ‘disaster’, says Red Wall MPs’ leader
The Labour MP Jo White has also said this morning that Labour HQ should not block Andy Burnham from being a byelection candidate in Gorton and Denton. (See 11.05am.) White is MP for Bassetlaw and leads the Red Wall caucus in parliament, which represents Labour MPs who won seats in the north and the Midlands that were traditionally Labour but that turned Tory in 2019, after Brexit. White said:
Let the North decide who their Labour candidate should be for the Gorton and Denton by election. A London stitch up will be a disaster for Labour.
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