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6 hours ago
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Good morning. At least this week we’re not going to have to put up with all the usual guff about the “special relationship”. UK politics this week will be dominated by Keir Starmer’s meeting with Donald Trump in the White House on Thursday, which was described as “probably … one of the most consequential meetings of a British prime minister and president that we have had since the second world war” by Sir Peter Westmacott, a former British ambassador to Washington., on the Westminster Hour last night. For the last 30 years at least, whenever a PM has met a new US president for the first time, commentary has inevitably focused on what it said about the state of the “special relationship”. Despite making the British sound insecure and needy, as a media narrative it always worked because it was simple and appealed to patriotic notions of British exceptionalism.
But last week it became clear that the “special relationship” that seems to matter most to Trump is the one he has with Vladimir Putin. There will still be huge interest in the outcome of the Starmer/Trump meeting. But the parameters have now shifted, and No 10 will probably be happy with a relationship that is positive, functioning, and not entirely disastrous for Ukraine.
Today is the third anniversary of the Russian invasion and this morning Starmer is joining European leaders in a call hosted by the Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to discuss the war. The Home Office has marked the anniversary by announcing that it intends to tighten rules to stop “elites linked to the Russian state” coming to the UK.
In a news release the Home Office says:
Under the new measures, the government will expand the criteria for exclusion to cover Kremlin-linked elites. This will ensure that, while Russia remains an acute national security threat, elites linked to the Russian state can be prevented from entering the UK.
Those who could be barred from the UK include anyone who provides significant support to the Russian state and/or those who owe their significant status or wealth to the Russian state and/or those who enjoy access to the highest levels of the Russian state.
Kremlin-linked elites can pose a real and present danger to our way of life. They denounce our values in public while enjoying the benefits of the UK in private - benefits which they look to deprive Ukraine of through their support of Russia’s war. They can act as tools for the Russian state, enabling the continuation and expansion of Russia’s aggression.
In practice, it is not clear what impact, if any, this is likely to have. The government has already imposed numerous sanctions on people linked to the Kremlin over the past three years (more are expected later today) and the Russians who are prominent in British public life (like the ones who turn up at Tory fundraisers) claim they are not Putin supporters. But the government is trying to send out a message. And it wants to draw a contrast with what used to happen, as described in the intelligence and security committee’s report published in 2020. The ISC said:
Successive governments have welcomed the oligarchs and their money with open arms, providing them with a means of recycling illicit finance through the London ‘laundromat’, and connections at the highest levels with access to UK companies and political figures.
Here is the agenda for the day.
9am: Keir Starmer is joining remotely a meeting of Eurpoean leaders hosted by Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the Ukraininan president, to mark the third anniversary of the Russian invasion. Starmer is due to give a speech at about 10.45am. Martin Belam is covering the meeting on our Ukraine live blog.
10am: Mike Amesbury, the MP for Runcorn and Helsy, will be sentenced after pleading guilty to assault last month.
10.30am: John Swinney, the Scottish first minister, attends an event in Edinburgh to mark the anniversary of the invasion of Ukraine.
11.30am: Downing Street holds a lobby briefing.
Lunchtime: Starmer attends a virtual meeting of G7 leaders to discuss Ukraine.
2.30pm: Yvette Cooper, the home secretary, takes questions in the Commons.
After 3.30pm: David Lammy, the foreign secretary, is due to make a statement to MPs on Ukraine.
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